Yoko Kidani
Researcher who, in Steven Bensinger's lab at UCLA, showed that activated killer T cells need SREBP-driven fat and cholesterol synthesis to expand
Steven Bensinger group, David Geffen School of Medicine, UCLA (papers 2011–2016, at the time of the study)
Yoko Kidani is first author of an Atlas study (KID2013) on what CD8 T cells, the immune cells that kill virus-infected cells, need when they wake up. Within hours of activation they switch on genes for making fatty acids and cholesterol, the raw material for new cell membranes. The paper showed that this switch depends on SREBP proteins, the master regulators of lipid synthesis, and that the signal runs from PI3K through mTOR to SREBP: rapamycin given 30 minutes before stimulation blocked it in cells. T cells without SREBP activity could not grow and divide properly, and in mice infected with a virus they failed to expand.
The study is one of the clearest links between mTOR and immune cell metabolism. It helps explain why rapamycin and related drugs suppress the immune system: by blocking mTOR they also cut off the lipid supply that a dividing T cell needs. The key experiments were in mouse cells and mice.
Kidani worked in Steven Bensinger's group at the David Geffen School of Medicine, UCLA, where Bensinger, the senior author, studies how lipid metabolism shapes immune cells. Other papers from that period include a 2011 study with the same group on how liver X receptors help keep neutrophil numbers in balance. Later positions could not be confirmed, so the affiliation shown is the one at the time of the study.
Milestones in the Atlas
A selection, not a full bibliography: only papers that meet the Atlas inclusion criteria.
| Year | Evidence | Study |
|---|---|---|
| 2013 | M | Sterol regulatory element-binding proteins are essential for the metabolic programming of effector T cells and adaptive immunity KID2013 First author: showed that activated CD8 T cells need SREBP-driven lipid synthesis, switched on through PI3K and mTOR, to expand during viral infection. |
Co-authors in the Atlas 1
People with a profile here who share at least one study with Yoko Kidani.
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- Steven J. Bensinger Studies how lipid metabolism shapes innate and adaptive immunity; his lab showed in mice that activated CD8 T cells need SREBP-driven cholesterol and fatty-acid synthesis, switched on through mTOR, in order to grow and divide.
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