Mitsugu Yanagidaira, MD, PhD
Tokyo Medical and Dental University

Talk Title: Heteroduplex Oligonucleotides: A Platform for Enhanced Efficacy and Improved Safety of Antisense Oligonucleotides

Mitsugu Yanagidaira, MD, PhD, is a Postdoctoral Research Fellow at Brigham and Women’s Hospital and Harvard Medical School. He received his MD and PhD from Tokyo Medical and Dental University (now the Institute of Science Tokyo), where he conducted research as a Postdoctoral Research Fellow. His passion lies in developing nucleic acid therapeutics for neuromuscular diseases. His research has focused on heteroduplex oligonucleotides (HDOs), a novel oligonucleotide platform composed of an antisense oligonucleotide, a complementary strand, and a targeting ligand, designed to improve therapeutic delivery and safety. His current and future research focuses on elucidating the molecular mechanisms underlying neurodegenerative diseases through the study of somatic mutations and translating these discoveries into novel therapeutic strategies.