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INSTITUTE FOR BIOGENESIS RESEARCH

By Ken Ige, Star-Bulletin
Scientist Ryuzo Yanagimachi, top, smiles at Cumulina,
the world's first cloned mouse, now stuffed and mounted
on a block. Yanagimachi and his team are happy in their
new digs at the Institute for Biogenesis Research, where
Cumulina will be on display for the grand opening today.

The scientists who brought
the first cloned mouse into
the world move to a new,
state-of-the-art facility

Daughter inspired contribution

---

By Helen Altonn
Star-Bulletin

Of all the guests at today's dedication of a new University of Hawaii-Manoa laboratory building, the most celebrated probably is the mouse mounted on a block.

Tiny Cumulina, holding a mock chunk of cheese, is prominently displayed in the Institute for Biogenesis Research as the world's first cloned mouse.

The cloning of generations of mice and other pioneering accomplishments of Ryuzo Yanagimachi, UH professor of anatomy and reproductive biology, and his team led to construction of the state-funded, $4.9 million institute.

"Team Yana's" new quarters -- added to the Biomedical Sciences Building -- are bright, airy and spacious. They're a stark contrast to the cramped, hot, noisy labs the researchers previously occupied in the food services building across the street on East-West Center Road.

By Ken Ige, Star-Bulletin
Tomoharu Osada uses a microscope in the
$4.9 million facility.

Associate professor Steve Ward and assistant professor Yusuke Marikawa, Yanagimachi's newest faculty members, said they were impressed that such high-quality research was done in such inadequate facilities.

"I can't imagine what we can do here," Ward said. "We have big, big dreams for the institute and the medical school."

Dr. Edwin Cadman, dean of the John A. Burns School of Medicine, said the institute is "an example of how wonderfully the state and private people and university can work together to provide an excellent research facility."

The Harold K.L. Castle Foundation gave $1 million to the institute, to be used to recruit faculty, and the Kosasa Family Foundation contributed $75,000.

"Research is a business," Cadman said, pointing out that results related to new discoveries are products, like computer chips, that can attract quality faculty and generate funding.

Yanagimachi has three more faculty positions to fill for his expanded program in germ cell research, cloning, functions of genes (transgenesis and gene knockout, or inactivating genes), and prevention and cure of congenital malformation.

Using what they termed the "Honolulu Technique," Yanagimachi's group made worldwide headlines in 1998 after cloning five generations of female mice. They also cloned the first male mouse, Fibro.

Cumulina died May 5 this year. She was 2 years and 7 months old -- comparable to 100 years in a human, Yanagimachi said.

The distinguished researcher, also noted for advances in in-vitro fertilization and freeze-dried sperm technology, said the group is trying to improve the efficiency of cloning and study its genetic safety.

He is interested in differences in cells involved in diseases and aging.

By Ken Ige, Star-Bulletin
Ryuzo Yanagimachi, front, with team members
Steve Ward, back left, and Yusuke Marikawa,
back right, at the entry to the UH's new, high-tech
science facility, the Institute for Biogenesis Research.

"There is still a lot of groundbreaking to do," said Ward, 43, who came here after 10 years at the Robert Wood Johnson Medical School in New Jersey. He had collaborated with Yanagimachi for 10 years, specializing in cell biology and DNA structure.

Marikawa, 33, joined Team Yana after completing postdoctoral research at the University of Toronto, Canada. Cell differentiation and body-pattern formation are his prime interests.

He worked largely on frogs, and has ideas about their development that the group is applying to mice. Yukiko Yamazaki, 36, joined the team last year as a postdoctoral student and is the group leader for cloning and transgenesis research.

"She has done fantastic work on cloning from different cells," Ward said.

Yanagimachi said his team probably wouldn't have cloned Cumulina if it hadn't been for Dolly, the cloned sheep in Scotland. "People cast doubt on it. We proved we could do it," he said.

Still, there is a lot to do on basic principles of cloning, the researchers said.

The institute went up quickly -- within a year -- but fund raising hasn't kept pace, Yanagimachi noted. The team is seeking grants and other funds for continued growth.

He is using his old office until next month to review grants, but his staff recently had a lab party and moved his filing cabinets and hundreds of books to his new office.

"Everybody wants the captain of the ship here," Ward said. "He's a great source of inspiration and ideas."

Yanagimachi said his role is "making an environment where people can work ... and bloom."

Research laboratory facts Name Institute for Biogenesis Research, John A. Burns School of Medicine, University of Hawaii Staff 20 researchers (faculty, postdoctoral candidates and students) and two administrative support persons Funding $4.9 million from the state for construction; $1 million from the Harold K.L. Castle Foundation; $75,000 from the Kosasa Family Foundation Size Two stories, 15,000 square feet Major research areas using mice How germ cells (eggs and sperm) are formed, mature and unite to form new individuals Testing the biological and genetic safety of cloning Using transgenesis (introducing a foreign gene or genes into the egg of another species together with a spermatozoon) to study the function of genes and whether some forms of genetic diseases can be cured Prevention and cure of congenital malformation by studying how a single cell (fertilized egg) multiplies and differentiates into thousands of different types of cells

Daughter’s death
-- and life -- inspires
contribution

---

By Helen Altonn
Star-Bulletin

James and Marion Osborn of Hawaii Kai were expected to attend the dedication today of the Institute for Biogenesis Research with a photograph of their daughter, Kathleen.

Her death 30 years ago in a traffic accident at age 20 while attending the University of Missouri led the Osborns to make a recent contribution to the University of Hawaii institute.

Professor Ryuzo Yanagimachi, institute director, praised the gift as a generous example of community support for the research program.

Mrs. Osborn said Kathleen worked for two years under a Ford Foundation scholarship at the University of Kansas Medical School's reproductive physiology lab while going to the University of Missouri.

Her goal was to move to Hawaii and work in cancer research at UH. "She had parts of her plan put together, and there was this accident," her mother said.

The Osborns buried Kathleen at the National Memorial Cemetery of the Pacific, Punchbowl, in 1970 and moved here four years later from Kansas City, Mo.

They established a memorial lectureship for their daughter at the University of Kansas Medical School.

Last year, Gilbert Greenwald, who recently retired as head of the Department of Reproductive Physiology at the University of Kansas Medical School, informed the Osborns Yanagimachi was to be the speaker.

"We contacted him (Yanagimachi) to say how pleased we were that someone from Hawaii was delivering the 29th lecture," Osborn said. "And the fact that Dr. Yanagimachi had cloned mice -- that was really spectacular, so we felt very honored that he accepted, and he gave that lecture Nov. 15."

Yanagimachi invited the Osborns to visit his old laboratory.

"He showed us where the mice were kept," Mrs. Osborn said.

"Cumulina was still alive. When she passed away, we made a contribution to his department in memory of our daughter. We thought maybe the money could be used for display of Cumulina, or however he wanted to use it."