Mr. Yasuyoshi Mizutani received the 2024 (26th) Acta Histochemica et Cytochemica Award. The award ceremony was held at the 65th Annual Meeting of the Japan Society of Histochemistry and Cytochemistry on October 26th, 2024.

Yasuyoshi Mizutani, Kazuya Shiogama, Ken-ichi Inada, Toshiyuki Takeuchi, Atsuko Niimi, Motoshi Suzuki, Yutaka Tsutsumi. Enzyme-labeled Antigen Method: Factors Influencing the Deterioration of Antigen-binding Activity of Specific Antibodies during Formalin Fixation and Paraffin Embedding. Acta Histochemica et Cytochemica. 55(5):129-148, 2022.
(https://doi.org/10.1267/ahc.22-00023)

From Silapakorn University, Thailand, we have accepted an exchange student Chayanit Pattanapong, the third lady from the left. She will be at our lab for 12 weeks.

On the Feb 9th, Dr. Siwanon Jirawatnotai visited us from Mahidol University, Thailand. He gave us a wonderful lecture entitled 'Capitalizing the cancer dynamic re-wiring for cholangiocarcinoma therapy'. We thank him very much for the fruitful discussion with graduate students.

On the Nov 17th, Dr. MeiChee Tai visited us from Cancer Research Malaysia. She gave us a wonderful lecture entitled 'Polygenic risk scores for prediction of breast cancer risk in Asian populations'. We discussed lots of things. Thank you!

'LASP1, CERS6, and Actin Form a Ternary Complex That Promotes Cancer Cell Migration', was published in Cancers. We sincerely thank collaborators and other persons who supported this project.

The ceramide synthase CERS6 (Ceramide Synthase 6) was overexpressed in non-small cell lung cancer, while elevated expression was associated with increased cell migration, poor prognosis, and lymph node metastasis*1). Previous studies have shown that CERS6 promotes the formation of local structures called lamellipodia, which are essential for cancer cell migration*2), though the detailed mechanism has not been elucidated.

In this study, we identified LASP1 (LIM and SH3 domain protein 1) as a novel binding partner of CERS6 by mass spectrometry analysis. LASP1 has been known to promote the migratory ability of cancer cells through interaction with actin. Interestingly, we found that the interaction between LASP1 and actin is CERS6-dependent. In addition, CERS6 itself also interacts with actin in a LASP1-dependent manner. The ternary complex of CERS6-LASP1-actin revealed a critical role for the cell migration activation mechanism, which is an early step in cancer metastasis. This finding might influence the development of inhibitors in lung cancer metastasis.

*1)　Suzuki M et al. CERS6 required for cell migration and metastasis in lung cancer. J Clin Mol Med, 24: 11949-11959, 2020.
*2)　Shi H et al. CEBPgamma facilitates lamellipodia formation and cancer cell migration through CERS6 upregulation. Cancer Sci 112:2770-2780, 2021.