“The 82th of Stem Cell Biology and Regenerative Medicine Forum”
Date：Jun 24th (Wed) 2015
Time : 18:00 〜 19:30
Place：Auditorium in 1st Building at Institute of Medical Science in Univ. of Tokyo------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------（Internal Speaker）
18:00-18:30
Hiroshi Watarai (Division of Stem Cell Cellomics, Center for Stem Cell
Biology and Regenerative Medicine, IMUST)ImPACT of Serendipiter on Hematology and Immunology（External Speaker）
18:30-19:30
Keisuke Goda (Professor, Department of Chemistry, Graduate School ofScience, University of Tokyo, Program Manager, ImPACT Program, Cabinet
Office, Government of Japan)
Serendipiter – a cell search engine that turns serendipity into planned
happenstance-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Hosted by Center for Stem Cell Biology and Regenerative Medicine---Information--＊ Please register attendance at the reception desk.

＊ Next forum（the83rd）will be held on

Jul. 31st（Fri）18:00〜 at Tommy Hall
＊ Please contact tatsu-m@ims.u-tokyo.ac.jp, for Forum speaker recommendations

ImPACT of Serendipiter on Hematology and Immunology
Hiroshi Watarai (Division of Stem Cell Cellomics, Center for Stem Cell
Biology and Regenerative Medicine, IMUST )Fluorescence-activated cell sorting (FACS), a specialized type of flow cytometry,provides a method for sorting a heterogeneous mixture of biological cells into two
or more containers, one cell at a time, based upon the specific light scattering andfluorescent characteristics of each cell. A wide range of fluorophores can be usedas labels in flow cytometry. Fluorophores, or simply "fluors", are typically attached
to an antibody that recognizes a target feature on or in the cell; they may also beattached to a chemical entity with affinity for the cell membrane or another cellularstructure. Each fluorophore has a characteristic peak excitation and emission
wavelength, and the emission spectra often overlap. Consequently, the technology
has applications in a number of fields, including molecular biology, pathology,immunology, plant biology and marine biology. It has broad application in
medicine (especially in transplantation, hematology, tumor immunology andchemotherapy, prenatal diagnosis, genetics and sperm sorting for sex preselection).
However, potential limitations of FACS include the need for antibodies that target
specific proteins; fortunately, large-scale projects such as the Human Protein Atlas
are continuously producing antibodies that will enable the isolation of ever more
subtypes of cells. Another relevant limitation of FACS is the requirement of a large
starting volume, which hampers the isolation of cells from extremely low volume
samples such as fine-needle aspirates. Similarly, FACS is neither well suited for theisolation of extremely rare cells because of false positive signals, nor forenvironmental samples containing extremely heterogeneous cell sizes. Currently,
FACS also fails to image the cell to be sorted, thereby preventing the combinationof morphological and transcriptomic analyses. Developments in flow
imaging-based cytometry may address this problem in the future. The“serendipiter”, next generation cytometry, will give disruptive innovation inhematological and immunological fields.

Serendipiter – a cell search engine that turns serendipity into planned
happenstance
Keisuke Goda (Professor, Department of Chemistry, Graduate School ofScience, University of Tokyo
Program Manager, ImPACT Program, Cabinet Office, Government of Japan)
Science builds on reproducibility – one of the most fundamental principles of the scientificmethod under which an experimental test must be reproduced or replicated in order to verify
whether a proposed hypothesis is correct. This principle is based on the assumption that thetested system be sufficiently simple so that experimental results can easily be reproduced. Overthe past century, physical science has evolved significantly by virtue of “easy” reproducibility.
As the system becomes more and more complex (e.g., large molecules, biological cells, andmicrobes), it is increasingly difficult to achieve reproducibility and the chance of uncovering
hidden laws of nature hence decreases, rendering the act of making discoveries more and more
serendipitous or accidental.
To address this fundamental problem in science, my interdisciplinary team (through the ImPACT
program funded by the Cabinet Office in the Government of Japan) currently works on thedevelopment of a cell search engine – the biological analog of a search engine like Google’s.
This technology known as the “serendipiter” is based on a unique integration of novel methods
in photonics, microfluidics, gene engineering, and information technology and is expected toscreen target single cells in a large heterogeneous population of cells with high throughput, highspecificity, and high sensitivity. Therefore, this technology will turn difficult-to-reproduce
biological events into easy experimental tests and hence serendipity into planned happenstance.