Keynote speech : The use of patient iPSCs for drug discovery and development of neurodegenerative diseases

  Keynote Speaker: Prof. Haruhisa Inoue, Kyoto university

  Haruhisa Inoue received his M.D. from Kyoto University in 1992. He completed

 a residency in clinical neurology at Kyoto University Hospital and at Sumitomo Hospital. After obtaining his Ph.D. degree from Kyoto University in 2000, he held postdoctoral positions at RIKEN Brain Science Institute and Harvard Medical School. 

  He is a pioneer in the field of iPSC-based drug discovery and, currently, is head of the Department of Fundamental Cell Technology at the Center for iPSC Research and Application (CiRA) of Kyoto University and a principal investigator at RIKEN.

  Abstract: Induced pluripotent stem cells (iPSCs) have the ability to proliferate infinitely and differentiate into cells of various organs in the body, including the brain. However, the analysis of neurodegenerative diseases including amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) and related disorders using patient-derived cells has been limited, as it is difficult to collect living neurons from patients, and cells have already degenerated or disappeared in postmortem pathological tissues. The advent of iPSCs has made it possible to generate disease models by differentiating patient iPSCs into neural cells and analyzing their phenotype. These models are now being used in the research and development of therapeutics, including the elucidation of pathological conditions and the screening of compounds for drug discovery.

  In this symposium, I will talk about the research of neurodegenerative diseases using patient iPSCs toward drug discovery and development.