Chief Scientist Laboratories Nonequilibrium Physics of Living Matter Laboratory
Chief Scientist: Kyogo Kawaguchi (Ph.D.)
Research Summary

We are a biophysics research group exploring phase transitions, morphogenesis, evolution, and chromatin physics through both experimental and theoretical approaches. We integrate physics, machine learning, and a range of experimental techniques, from cell-based assays to single-molecule observation, to address diverse biological questions from an original viewpoint.
Main Research Fields
- Mathematical & Physical Sciences
Related Research Fields
- Complex Systems
- Biological Sciences
- Biology
- Biophysics, chemical physics and soft matter physics-related
- Mathematical physics and fundamental theory of condensed matter physics-related
Keywords
- Nonequilibrium
- Collective cell dynamics
- Morphological evolution
- Chromatin
Selected Publications
Papers with an asterisk(*) are based on research conducted outside of RIKEN.
- 1.
Cerbus, R.T., Hiratani, I., and Kawaguchi, K.:
"Homeotic and non-homeotic patterns in the tetrapod vertebral formula"
PNAS 121, 2411421121 (2024). - 2.
Adachi, K., and Kawaguchi, K.:
"Predicting heteropolymer interactions: Demixing and hypermixing of disordered protein sequences"
Phys Rev X 14, 031011 (2024). - 3.
Lubana, E.S., Kawaguchi, K., Dick, R.P., and Tanaka, H.:
"A percolation model of emergence: Analyzing transformers trained on a formal language"
Accepted at ICML (2025). - 4.
Fukai, Y., and Kawaguchi, K.:
"LapTrack: Linear assignment particle tracking with tunable metrics"
Bioinformatics, 39, btac799 (2022). - 5.
Yamamoto, T., Cockburn, K., Greco, V., and Kawaguchi, K.:
"Probing the rules of cell coordination in live tissues by interpretable machine learning based on graph neural networks"
PLOS Comp Biol 18, e1010477 (2022). - 6.
Adachi, K., Takasan, K., and Kawaguchi, K.:
"Activity-induced phase transition in a quantum many-body system"
Phys Rev Research 4, 013194 (2022). - 7.
Mesa, K.R., Kawaguchi, K., Cockburn, K., Gonzalez, D., Boucher, J., Xin, T., Klein, A.M., and Greco, V.:
"Homeostatic Epidermal Stem Cell Self-Renewal Is Driven by Local Differentiation"
Cell Stem Cell 23, 677 (2018). - 8.
*Kawaguchi, K., Kageyama, R., and Sano, M.:
"Topological defects control collective dynamics in neural progenitor cell cultures"
Nature 545, 327–331 (2017).
Recent Research Results
Related Links
Lab Members
Principal investigator
- Kyogo Kawaguchi
- Chief Scientist
Contact Information
2-2-3, Minatojima-minamimachi,
Chuo-ku, Hyogo
650-0047, Japan
Email: kyogo.kawaguchi@riken.jp