| Kazu Nakazawa, M.D., Ph.D.
Dr. Kazutoshi Nakazawa is the Chief of the Unit on the Genetics of Cognition and Behavior, Mood and Anxiety Disorders Program, National Institute of Mental Health. Dr. Nakazawa received his medical degree in 1987 and earned his Ph.D in 1991, both of which from Keio University School of Medicine in Tokyo, Japan, investigating the elucidation of molecular diversity of mammalian glycosyltransferase families. In 1991, he began post-doctoral training for neuroscience at Laboratory for Neural Networks, Frontier Research Programs (later jointed into Brain Science Institute) in the Institute of Chemical and Physical Research (RIKEN Institute) at Wako, Japan. During this time, his research was focused upon the molecular and cellular mechanisms of cerebellar long-term depression (LTD). His research revealed a possible involvement of AMPA receptor phosphorylation and c-JunB, one of immediate early genes, in induction and expression of cerebellar LTD, respectively. In 1995 he moved to Center for Learning and Memory at Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) as a research fellow and he became a research associate in 2000. While at MIT he pursued the development of cell type-restricted gene manipulation systems in different brain-subregions by over-expressing Cre recombinase in transgenic mice. Utilizing the systems, he created several conditional NMDA receptor knockout mice in a brain cell-type specific manner. He extensively analyzed one of the conditional NMDA receptor knockout mouse strains, hippocampal CA3 pyramidal cell-specific NMDA receptor knockout mice, with a state-of-art in vivo multi-electrode recording techniques from awake-behaving mice and with rodent behavioral techniques. He discovered (1) CA3 NMDA receptors are crucial for memory acquisition of one-trial experience, (2) the same receptors are also required for associative memory recall (i.e., pattern completion) during recall. From these studies based on both behavioral and electrophysiological techniques, NMDA receptor channels expressed in the same CA3 pyramidal cells have been shown to play multiple roles in the hippocampus-dependent mnemonic process. Dr. Nakazawa joined the NIMH in March, 2003. His unit relies on a multidisciplinary approach using the techniques of rodent genetics, molecular and cellular biochemistry, neurobiology, histochemistry, in vivo tetrode recording, and rodent behavioral analysis. Current research goal of his unit is an expansion of previous findings, of particular interest is to clarify the functional role of neuronal activity of rodent limbic cortex in mnemonic process implicated in declarative (explicit) memory. |
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