EC Neurology

Renowned Japanese neuroscientist Takayuki Murakoshi died at his home in Tokyo on 14 September 2024. Dr Takayuki Murakoshi was born in Maebashi, Gunma in 1956 and graduated from the School of Medicine at Tokyo Medical and Dental University in 1981 and received his PhD from the Department of Pharmacology at the same university under the supervision of Professor Masanori Otsuka. After working as a research assistant in the same department in several important collaborations [1,2], he was a postdoctoral fellow at Rockefeller University, USA, working with Nobel Laureate Torsten Nils Wiesel from 1988 to 1990. He then returned to Japan as a research associate in his former department of pharmacology and, since 1996, as an associate professor. In 2002 he moved to the Department of Pharmacology at Nippon Medical School and in 2003 to the Graduate School of Arts and Sciences at the University of Tokyo. He was then invited to Saitama Medical University as a professor in the Department of Biochemistry, School of Medicine, and served as dean of the School of Medicine from 2018, and retired in March 2024 to become a professor emeritus. Diagnosed with pancreatic cancer three years ago, he had been recuperating at home while continuing to conduct collaborative research and online research meetings via the Internet and other means. He died peacefully in the early morning of 14 September 2024, surrounded by his family.

1. Murakoshi T., et al. “The role of the N-terminus in the active conformation of the substance P analogues”. European Journal of Pharmacology1 (1983): 133-137.
2. Yanagisawa M., et al. “Tail-pinch method in vitro and the effects of some antinociceptive compounds”. European Journal of Pharmacology2 (1984): 231-239.
3. Murakoshi T., et al. “A pharmacological study on respiratory rhythm in the isolated brainstem‐spinal cord preparation of the newborn rat”. British Journal of Pharmacology1 (1985): 95-104.
4. Murakoshi T. “Cholinergic modulation of synaptic transmission in the rat visual cortex in vitro”. Vision Research1 (1995): 25-35.
5. Yoshie M., et al. “Music performance anxiety in skilled pianists: effects of social-evaluative performance situation on subjective, autonomic, and electromyographic reactions”. Experimental Brain Research 2 (2009): 117-126.
6. Hashizume M., et al. “Acute sleep deprivation reduces oscillatory network inhibition in the young rat basolateral amygdala”. Neuroscience 401 (2019): 73-83.
7. Hashizume M., et al. “Correlation between cued fear memory retrieval and oscillatory network inhibition in the amygdala is disrupted by acute REM sleep deprivation”. Neuroscience 536 (2024): 12-20.