Professor Teruo Okano is currently an Emeritus Professor at Tokyo Women’s Medical University (TWMU) in Tokyo, Japan. He is also a distinguished adjunct professor in the University of Utah Department of Molecular Pharmaceutics, and is the co-director of CSTEC@Utah. He pioneered cell sheet engineering technology by developing the temperature-responsive polymer-coated dishes necessary for creating and harvesting cell sheets.
RESEARCH INTERESTS
Cell sheet technology uses poly(N-isopropylacrylamide) (PIPAAm)-grafted temperature-responsive culture dishes that allow cells to spontaneously detach as confluent sheets without the damaging enzymes necessary for standard cell harvest. These cell sheets maintain the natural extracellular matrix (ECM), cell-cell junctions, and surface proteins that are broken or damaged during traditional enzymatic detachment methods and can spontaneously adhere when transplanted, ensuring localization and retention of cells at the transplantation site and negating the need for scaffold support materials. Cell sheet technology is widely applicable and has shown clinical success in regenerating a variety of tissues in vivo.
Selected Publications
Journal Article
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Rapid and effective preparation of clonal bonemarrow-derived mesenchymal stem/stromal cell sheets to reduce renal fibrosis. S Kameishi, CM Dunn, M Oka, K Kim, YK Cho, SU Song, DW Grainger, T Okano. Scientific Reports. 2023 Mar 17;13(1)4421 https://doi.org/10.1038/s41598-023-31437-7
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Engineered bone marrow stem cell-sheets alleviate renal damage in a rat chronic glomerulonephritis model. B Wang, K Kim, M Tian, S Kameishi, L Zhuang, T Okano, Y Huang. International Journal of Molecular Sciences. 2023 Feb 13;24(4)3711 https://doi.org/10.3390/ijms24043711
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Clinically relevant mesenchymal stem/stromal cell sheet transplantation method for kidney disease. Oka M, Kameishi S, Cho YK, Song SU, Grainger DW, Okano T. Tissue Engineering Part C: Methods. 2023 Feb 1;29(2):54-62. doi: 10.1089/ten.tec.2022.0200