Dr. Norifumi Kawada
Dr. Atsushi Miyajima
Dr. Kenichi Ikejima
Dr. Soichi Kojima
Dr. Yutaka Yata
Dr. Kazuo Ikeda
Dr. Misako Matsubara
Dr. Le Thi Thanh Thuy
Professor Norifumi Kawada was graduated with M.D. degree in 1986 from Osaka City University Medical School. He obtained his Ph.D. degree from Osaka City University in 1991. From 1991 to 1992, Prof. Kawada trained as a Visiting Scientist, Institute of Biochemistry, Freiburg University. And then, from 1993 to 2006, he worked as a Research Associate, Assistant Professor, and Associate Professor in Osaka City University Graduate School of Medicine.
He was promoted as a professor of Osaka City University Graduate School of Medicine in 2007. He also serves as Director of Premire Preventive Medicine Center "MedCity21" at ABENO HARUKASU, Osaka City University Hospital. Professor Kawada is one of leading Hepatologists in Japan both in clinical research and in basic science and, in particular, is acknowledged as a pioneer in the field of liver fibrosis research with special reference to hepatic stellate cell biology. He has published 140 scholarly papers. He has served on councilor and scientific boards of major national internal medicine, hepatology and gastroenterology organizations, as the representative organizer of Japan Hepatic Sinusoidal Research and as Associate Editor and Editorial Board of peer-reviewed international medical journals. He is the Fellow of American Association for the Study of Liver Disease (FAASLD) and the International Member of European Association for the Study of the Liver (EASL) and Asian-Pacific Association for the Study of the Liver (APASL). Since 2015, he has been a visiting Professor, the UCL Institute for Liver and Digestive Health at the Royal Free Hospital, London, UK.
Dr. Le was appointed as Project Assistant Professor in the Department of Hepatology, Graduate School of Medicine, Osaka City University, Osaka, Japan in June 2019. She has earned her M.D. at Hanoi Medical University, Hanoi, Vietnam in 2001 at the top-first score. From 2002 to 2007, she has awarded the Japanese Monbusho scholarship for PhD course in Osaka University, concerning about HBV genotypes in Vietnam. From 2007-2014, she was a postdoctoral fellow at Osaka University for 2 years, and Osaka City University for 5 years, then she became a Project Associate Manager here from 2015-2019. She is interested in pathophysiological role of hepatic stellate cells in liver fibrosis, steatohepatitis, cirrhosis, and cancer. Her works concerned in the function, and mechanism action of Cytoglobin, a recently discovered globin by her professor, Norifumi Kawada. She uncovered the protective role of Cytoglobin in liver fibrosis and cancer which was registered 2 patents. She has published more than 20 peer-review papers including those in Hepatology, Nature Communications, Journal of Hepatology, Journal of Biological Chemistry, American Journal of Pathology, Scientific Reports, etc.; and 3 book-chapters on Springer Nature, and Elsevier publishing groups. She has continuously got research grants from Japan Society for the Promotion of Science since 2013. She has awarded other grants from Liver forum in Kyoto in 2015; the Osaka Medical Research Foundation for Intractable Diseases Grant in 2016; Gilead Science Research Scholar in Liver Diseases Asia, 2019-2021. Currently, her research interests fall into the production and application of Cytoglobin as a therapeutic target for liver fibrosis and cancer.
