The Role of Emerging Transporters OCTN1 and LAT1 in Drug Transport and Disease Treatment

Dr. Reiya Yamashita is an Assistant Professor in the faculty pharmacy, Kanazawa University. He received his Ph.D. in Pharmaceutical Sciences from Kanazawa University in 2025 under the supervision of Prof. Kato. His research focuses on pharmacokinetics and neuropharmacology, particularly on ergothioneine (ERGO)—a food-derived compound that reaches the brain via its membrane transporter OCTN1—and examines actions of ERGO in OCTN1-expressing brain cells, including neural stem cells and microglia.

Dr. Saki Noguchi is an Assistant Professor in the Division of Pharmaceutics at the Faculty of Pharmacy, Keio University. Her research focuses on pharmacokinetics, specifically the role of transporters in drug and endogenous metabolite disposition across key biological barriers like the placenta, blood-brain barrier, and renal proximal tubules. She earned her BS from Keio University and worked as a hospital pharmacist for one year before returning to complete her Ph.D. under the supervision of Professor Masatoshi Tomi and Professor Emi Nakashima. She has been an assistant professor in Professor Tomi's laboratory since 2017. Currently, she is one of the Caretakers for the Transporter Director’s Initiative Session (DIS) of the Japanese Society for the Study of Xenobiotics (JSSX).

Dr. Yukio Kato graduated from the University of Tokyo in 1990 and received a Ph.D. in 1998. He was appointed Research Associate at the University of Tokyo in 1993, Visiting Fellow at the National Institutes of Health, the USA in 2001, Associate Professor at Kanazawa University in 2002, and Full Professor at Kanazawa University in 2008 (Department of Molecular Pharmacotherapeutics). He has also been assigned as a Chair of the Faculty of Pharmacy, Kanazawa University in 2022 and President of JSSX (The Japanese Society for the Study of Xenobiotics) in 2023. His major research interests are pharmacokinetics and mathematical modeling of drug disposition, transporter-mediated drug efficacy/toxicity, and prophylactic pharmacology focusing on neurogenesis and brain cognitive function. He published 234 original research articles including 6 Nature journal series papers and 20 review articles.