December 19, 2018
Keio University
RIKEN
Sanyo-Onoda City University
National Agriculture and Food Research Organization (NARO)
A group of researchers, including Assistant Professor Takahiro Yamada and Associate Professor Kei Funahashi of the Department of Biosciences and Informatics, Faculty of Science and Technology, Keio University; Dr. Ruslan Deviatiiarov and Dr. Alexander Nesmelov of Kazan Federal University; Unit Leader Oleg Gusev of RIKEN; Professor Yoshiko Hiroi of Sanyo-Onoda City University; and principal investigator Katsuyuki Suetsugu, Senior Researcher Richard Cornette, and Senior Researcher Takahiro Kikawada of NARO, focused on the remarkable phenomenon of desiccation tolerance in Pv11 cells, which do not die when dried and resume cell division upon rehydration. Through transcriptome analysis, they identified genes presumed to be involved in this mechanism. The results revealed that to induce desiccation tolerance, there is high expression of genes that eliminate the effects of reactive oxygen species, which are harmful to living organisms, and genes that repair DNA damaged during desiccation upon rehydration. Based on these findings, it is expected that introducing the identified group of genes into other organisms that lack desiccation tolerance could lead to the creation of new organisms that can survive desiccation.
Prior to its publication in the academic journal *Scientific Reports*, an advance online version
of this research was published on the journal's website on Tuesday, December 18, 2018 (UK time).
Please see below for the full press release.