1999年に、BostonからNYに短期派遣となった際の思い出の勤務先、Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center（Department of Radiation Oncology, Richard N. Kolesnick）に訪れた。
当時新婚だったFrancois Paris氏の家で夜中まで夢を語り合った。
その後、「放射線照射や抗がん剤投与による卵巣機能低下の予防の研究」がトップジャーナルに掲載されて感激。懐かしい。
研究室訪れたが誰とも会えず残念。
論文タイトルなど
Oocyte apoptosis is suppressed by disruption of the acid sphingomyelinase gene or by sphingosine -1-phosphate therapy
Yutaka Morita, Gloria I. Perez, Jonathan L. Tilly
Nature Medicine 6, 1109–1114 (2000)
The time at which ovarian failure (menopause) occurs in females is determined by the size of the oocyte reserve provided at birth, as well as by the rate at which this endowment is depleted throughout post-natal life. Here we show that disruption of the gene for acid sphingomyelinase in female mice suppressed the normal apoptotic deletion of fetal oocytes, leading to neonatal ovarian hyperplasia. Ex vivo, oocytes lacking the gene for acid sphingomyelinase or wild-type oocytes treated with sphingosine-1-phosphate resisted developmental apoptosis and apoptosis induced by anti-cancer therapy, confirming cell autonomy of the death defect. Moreover, radiation-induced oocyte loss in adult wild-type female mice, the event that drives premature ovarian failure and infertility in female cancer patients, was completely prevented by in vivo therapy with sphingosine-1-phosphate. Thus, the sphingomyelin pathway regulates developmental death of oocytes, and sphingosine-1-phosphate provides a new approach to preserve ovarian function in vivo.