Elly Margaret Tanaka, (born 1965) is a biochemist and Scientific Director at the Institute of Molecular Biotechnology of the Austrian Academy of Sciences (IMBA) at the Vienna Biocenter, Austria. Tanaka studies the molecular cell biology of limb and spinal cord regeneration as well as the evolution of regeneration.
Early life and education
Tanaka was born in Boston, Massachusetts, and obtained a bachelor's degree in biochemistry from Harvard University in 1987 and a PhD from the University of California, San Francisco in 1993, where she had worked in the lab of Marc W. Kirschner. She then became a postdoctoral researcher in the lab of Jeremy Brockes at University College London and Ludwig Institute.
Research and career Tanaka started her own lab at the Max Planck Institute of Molecular Cell Biology and Genetics (MPI-CBG) in Dresden (Germany) in 1999. Her research focused on axolotl spinal cord regeneration.
In 2008, Tanaka became a professor at the Center for Regenerative Therapies Dresden (CRTD) of the Technische Universität Dresden. She became director of the center in 2014, before becoming senior scientist at the Research Institute of Molecular Pathology (IMP) in Vienna in 2016. In 2024, Tanaka joined the Institute of Molecular Biotechnology of the Austrian Academy of Sciences (IMBA) as Scientific Director. The Mexican salamander species axolotl is Tanaka's main model system for her research and is also working to translate them to mouse and human tissue. Using innovative molecular biology and microscopy methods, she identified those stem cells that underlie the regeneration of limbs and the spinal cord. She is a member of the Editorial Board for Developmental Cell.
Awards and honours
2026: Fellow of the Royal Society (FRS) 2025: Schleiden Medal 2025: Wittgenstein Award 2024: Elected to the German National Academy of Sciences Leopoldina 2023: Elected to the National Academy of Sciences 2021: Elected to the Austrian Academy of Sciences 2020: FEBS | EMBO Women in Science Award 2018: Erwin Schrödinger Prize of the Austrian Academy of Sciences 2017: Honorary Professor, TU Dresden 2017: Elected member of European Molecular Biology Organization 2017: Ernst Schering Prize 2017: Female Scientist Award, German Stem Cell Network 2015: Elected member of the Academia Europaea
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