Gareth Fraser

Associate Professor

Ph.D., King’s College, London

512 Carr Hall
(352) 273-4758
g.fraser@ufl.edu

Research Interests

I study the relationship between evolution, development and regeneration in a range of vertebrate structures, including teeth, skin appendages and sensory structures. The work in the Fraser Lab is centered on the study of a selection of intriguing fish models of evolutionary developmental biology (EvoDevo), including pufferfish, cichlids and sharks. Some of our most recent projects have focused on tooth regeneration and we have discovered stem cell niches associated with the continuously regenerative dentition of sharks, and the tooth-to-beak transition that occurs during pufferfish development. Our lab is interested in how vertebrates make, shape and regenerate complex morphologies. We have also recently discovered that shark skin teeth (denticles) develop via a highly conserved Turing-like patterning mechanism; a developmental process shared with bird feather and mammalian hair development.

Representative Publications

RL Cooper, AP Thiery, AG Fletcher, DJ Delbarre, LJ Rasch, GJ Fraser. (2018). An ancient Turing-like patterning mechanism regulates skin denticle development in sharks Science Advances. 2018 Nov 7;4(11): eaau5484.

AP Thiery, T Shono, D Kurokawa, R Britz, Z Johanson, GJ Fraser (2017). Spatially restricted dental regeneration drives pufferfish beak development Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. 114 (22), E4425-E4434

KJ Martin, LJ Rasch, RL Cooper, BD Metscher, Z Johanson, GJ Fraser (2016). Sox2+ progenitors in sharks link taste development with the evolution of regenerative teeth from denticlesProceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. 113 (51), 14769-14774

LJ Rasch, KJ Martin, RL Cooper, BD Metscher, CJ Underwood, GJ Fraser (2016). An ancient dental gene set governs development and continuous regeneration of teeth in sharks Developmental Biology. 415 (2), 347-370

Fraser GJ, Hamed S, Martin KJ, and Hunter K. 2019. Shark tooth regeneration reveals common stem cell characters in both human rested lamina and ameloblastoma. Scientific Reports. 9: 15956.

Bloomquist RB, Fowler TE, An Z, Yu T, Abdilleh K, Fraser GJ, Sharpe P, and Streelman JT. 2019. Developmental plasticity of epithelial stem cells in tooth and taste bud renewal. PNAS. 116 (36) 17858-17866.

Cooper RL, Lloyd VJ, Di-Poï N, Fletcher AG, Barrett P, and Fraser GJ. 2019. Conserved gene signalling and a derived patterning mechanism underlie the development of avian footpad scales. EvoDevo. 10(19)

Shono T, Thiery AP, Cooper RL, Kurokawa D, Britz R, Okabe M, and Fraser GJ. 2019. Evolution and developmental diversity of skin spines in pufferfishes. iScience. 19. 1244-1255.

Johanson Z, Martin KJ, Fraser GJ, James K. 2019. The synarcual of the Little Skate, Leucoraja erinacea: Novel development among the vertebrates. Frontiers in Ecology and Evolution. 7: 12

Link to full publication list