Person

Kawamura, Shoji

Person ID: ZDB-PERS-030730-2
Email: kawamura@k.u-tokyo.ac.jp
URL: http://www.jinrui.ib.k.u-tokyo.ac.jp/kawamura-home-E.html
Affiliation: Kawamura Lab
Address: Department of Integrated Biosciences Graduate School of Frontier Sciences The University of Tokyo Seimeitou #502 5-1-5 Kashiwanoha Kashiwa, Chiba , 277-8562 Japan
Country: Japan
Phone: 81-4-7136-5422
Fax: 81-4-7136-3692
ORCID ID

Biography and Research Interest

I am interested in evolution of color vision and visual systems of vertebrates. Visual pigments (or opsins) are key to understand animal vision and I have studied the genomic organization and spectral properties of opsins of diverse vertebrate species including lizards (American chameleon), birds (pigeon), primates (New World monkeys and prosimians), and fish (zebrafish). Fish and primates are particularly interesting because of their characteristic opsin repertoire possibly related to various visual behaviors.

Zebrafish is quite useful as a model to study regulatory mechanism of opsin expression. Zebrafish retina contains five distinct classes of photoreceptor cells, each expressing a distinct type of opsin gene. Such cell-type-specific opsin expression is a prerequisite of color vision. We isolated all of the visual opsin genes from the zebrafish genome and described their genomic organizations and spectral characteristics (Chinen et al. 2003 Genetics 163:663-675). This has enabled us to carry out systematic GFP-reporter assays using the genomic DNA fragments surrounding the opsin genes. We would like to explore the cis elements and transcription factors regulating the opsin expression by using the transgenic zebrafish whose specific photoreceptor cells are visualized with GFP.

Publications

Non-Zebrafish Publications

Hiramatsu, C., Tsutsui, T., Matsumoto, Y., Aureli, F., Fedigan, L. M. and Kawamura, S. (2005). Color vision polymorphism in wild capuchins (Cebus capucinus) and spider monkeys (Ateles geoffroyi) in Costa Rica. American Journal of Primatology, 67 (4):447-461.

Saito, A., Mikami, A. Kawamura, S., Ueno, Y., Hiramatsu, C., Widayati, K. A., Suryobroto, B., Teramoto, M., Mori, Y., Nagano, K., Fujita K., Kuroshima, H. and Hasegawa, T. (2005). Advantage of dichromats over trichromats in discrimination of color-camouflaged stimuli in non-human primates. American Journal of Primatology, 67 (4):425-436.

Saito, A., Kawamura, S., Mikami, A., Ueno, Y., Hiramatsu C., Koida, K., Fujita, K., Kuroshima, H. and Hasegawa, T. (2005). Demonstration of genotype-phenotype correlation in polymorphic color vision of a non-callitrichine New World monkey, capuchin Cebus apella. American Journal of Primatology, 67 (4):471-485.

Nagao, K., Takenaka, N., Hirai, M. and Kawamura, S. (2005). Coupling and decoupling of evolutionary mode between X- and Y-chromosomal red-green opsin genes in owl monkeys. Gene, 352:82-91.

Kim, I.-C., Kim, Y. J., Yoon, Y.-D., Kawamura, S., Lee, Y.-S. and Lee, J.-S. (2004). Cloning of cytochrome P450 1A (CYP1A) genes from the hermaphrodite fish Rivulus marmoratus and the Japanese medaka Oryzias latipes. Marine Environmental Research, 58 (2-5):125-129.

Hiramatsu, C., Radlwimmer, F. B., Yokoyama, S. and Kawamura S. (2004). Mutagenesis and reconstitution of middle-to-long-wave-sensitive visual pigments of New World monkeys for testing the tuning effect of residues at sites 229 and 233. Vision Research, 44 (19):2225-2231.

Kawamura, S. and Kubotera, N. (2004). Ancestral loss of short wave-sensitive cone visual pigment in lorisiform prosimians, contrasting with its strict conservation in other prosimians. Journal of Molecular Evolution, 58 (3):314-321.

Kawamura, S. and Kubotera, N. (2003). Absorption spectra of reconstituted visual pigments of a nocturnal prosimian, Otolemur crassicaudatus. Gene, 321:131-135.

Kawamura, S. (2003). Color vision diversity of New World monkeys. Brain 21, 6 (4):381-385 (in Japanese).

Kawamura, S., Takenaka, N., Hiramatsu, C., Hirai, M. and Takenaka, O. (2002). Y-chromosomal red-green opsin genes of nocturnal New World monkey. FEBS Letters, 530 (1-3):70-72.

Kawamura, S., Hirai, M., Takenaka, O., Radlwimmer, F. B. and Yokoyama, S. (2001). Genomic and spectral analyses of long to middle wavelength-sensitive visual pigments of common marmoset (Callithrix jacchus). Gene, 269 (1-2):45-51.

Kawamura, S. (2000). Evolution of red-green visual pigment genes and color vision of New World monkeys. Primate Research, 16 (2):111-124 (in Japanese).

Kawamura, S., Blow, N. S. and Yokoyama, S. (1999).Genetic analyses of visual pigments of the pigeon (Columba livia). Genetics, 153 (4): 1839-1850.

Yokoyama, S., Radlwimmer, F. B. and Kawamura, S. (1998). Regeneration of ultraviolet pigments of vertebrates. FEBS Letters, 423 (2):155-158.

Kawamura, S. and Yokoyama, S. (1998). Functional characterization of visual and nonvisual pigments of American chameleon (Anolis carolinensis). Vision Research, 38 (1):37-44.

Sumiyama, K., Kawamura, S., Takenaka, O. and Ueda, S. (1998). A high sequence variety in the immunoglobulin C-alpha hinge region among Old World monkeys. Anthropological Science, 106 (1):31-39.

Kawamura, S. and Yokoyama, S. (1997). Expression of visual and nonvisual opsins in American chameleon. Vision Research, 37 (14):1867-1871.

Kawamura, S. and Yokoyama, S. (1996). Molecular characterization of the pigeon P-opsin gene. Gene, 182 (1-2):213-214.

Kawamura, S. and Yokoyama, S. (1996). Phylogenetic relationships among short wavelength-sensitive opsins of American chameleon (Anolis carolinensis) and other vertebrates. Vision Research, 36 (18):2797-2804.

Kawamura, S. and Yokoyama, S. (1995). Paralogous origin of the rhodopsinlike opsin genes in lizards. Journal of Molecular Evolution, 40 (6):594-600.

Kawamura, S. and Yokoyama, S. (1994). Cloning of the rhodopsin-encoding gene from the rod-less lizard Anolis carolinensis. Gene, 149 (2):267-270.

Kawamura, S. and Yokoyama, S. (1993). Molecular characterization of the red visual pigment gene of the American chameleon (Anolis carolinensis). FEBS Letters, 323 (3):247-251.

Kawamura, S. and Ueda, S. (1992). Immunoglobulin CH gene family in hominoids and its evolutionary history. Genomics, 13 (1):194-200.

Kawamura, S., Saitou, N. and Ueda, S. (1992). Concerted evolution of the primate immunoglobulin alpha-gene through gene conversion. The Journal of Biological Chemistry, 267 (11):7359-7367.

Kawamura, S., Tanabe, H., Watanabe, Y., Kurosaki, K., Omoto, K. and Ueda, S. (1991). Evolution of the immunoglobulin alpha gene in primates. In: Primatology Today, A. Ehara, T. Kimura, O. Takenaka and M. Iwamoto (eds.), pp. 623-626, Elsevier, Amsterdam.

Kawamura, S., Tanabe, H., Watanabe, Y., Kurosaki, K., Saitou, N. and Ueda, S. (1991). Evolutionary rate of immunoglobulin alpha noncoding region is greater in hominoids than in Old World monkeys. Molecular Biology and Evolution, 8 (6):743-752.

Ueda, S. and Kawamura, S. (1990). Hominoid immunoglobulin alpha genes: multiple recombinational events in their hinge regions. In: Molecular Evolution, M. T. Clegg and S. T. O'Brien (eds.), pp. 13-18, Alan R. Liss, Inc., New York.

Kawamura, S., Omoto, K. and Ueda, S. (1990). Evolutionary hypervariability in the hinge region of the immunoglobulin alpha genes. Journal of Molecular Biology, 215 (2):201-206.

Kawamura, S., Omoto K. and Ueda, S. (1989). Nucleotide sequence of the gorilla immunoglobulin alpha1 gene. Nucleic Acids Research, 17 (16):6732.