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Chief Scientist Laboratories Evolutionary Morphology Laboratory

Chief Scientist: Shigeru Kuratani (Ph.D.)

Research Summary

Shigeru Kuratani(Ph.D.)

Evolution can be viewed as series of changes introduced to developmental programs of organisms. The ultimate goal of our research project is to reconstruct the mechanical background of development behind evolutionary novelties in vertebrates, such as jaws and turtle crapace, by comparing developmental processes and patterns between different animal species to identify the changed portion of development, by constructing phenocopies to modify a part of developmental programs of model animals, and by integrating the experimental data with fossil data, phylogenetic trees based on molecular data, and variety of genomes in animals.

Main Research Fields

  • Biological Sciences

Related Research Fields

  • Biology
  • Comparative Embryology
  • Comparative Morphology
  • Developmental Biology

Keywords

  • Head
  • Skeletomuscular system
  • Nervous system
  • Vertebrates
  • Cyclostomes

Selected Publications

  • 1. Higuchi, S., Sugahara, F., Oisi, Y., Pascual Anaya, J., Takagi, W., and Kuratani, S.:
    "Inner ear development in cyclostome and the evolution of vertebrate semicircular canals. "
    Nature 565, 347-350 (2019).
  • 2. Pascual-Anaya, J., Sato, I., Paps, J., Yandong, R., Sugahara, F., Higuchi, S., Takagi, W., Ruiz-Villalba, A., Ota, K. G., Wang, W., and Kuratani, S.:
    "Hagfish and lamprey Hox genes reveal conservation of temporal colinearity in vertebrates. "
    Nat. Ecol. Evol. 2, 859-866 (2018).
  • 3. Sugahara, F., Pascual-Anaya, J., Oisi, Y., Kuraku, S., Aota, S., Adachi, N., Takagi, W., Hirai, T., Sato, N., Murakami, Y., and Kuratani, S.:
    "Evidence from cyclostomes for complex regionalization of the ancestral vertebrate brain."
    Nature 531, 97-100 (2016).
  • 4. Hirasawa, T., Nagashima, H., and Kuratani, S.:
    "The endoskeletal origin of the turtle carapace."
    Nat. Commun. 4, 2107 (2013)
  • 5. Oisi, Y., Ota, K. G., Kuraku, S., Fujimoto, S. and Kuratani, S.:
    "Craniofacial development of hagfishes and the evolution of vertebrates."
    Nature 493, 175-180 (2013).
  • 6. Ota, K. G., Fujimoto, S., Oisi, Y., and Kuratani, S.:
    "Identification of vertebra-like elements and their possible differentiation from sclerotomes in the hagfish."
    Nat. Commun. 2, 373 (2011).
  • 7. Irie, N., and Kuratani, S.:
    "Comparative transcriptome analysis detects vertebrate phylotypic stage during organogenesis."
    Nat. Commun. 2, 248 (2011).
  • 8. Nagashima, H., Sugahara, F., Takechi, M., Ericsson, R., Kawashima-Ohya, Y., Narita, Y., and Kuratani, S.:
    "Evolution of the turtle body plan by the folding and creation of new muscle connections."
    Science 325, 193-196 (2009).
  • 9. Ota, K. G., Kuraku, S., and Kuratani, S.:
    "Hagfish embryology with reference to the evolution of the neural crest."
    Nature 446, 672-675 (2007).
  • 10. Shigetani, Y., Sugahara, F., Kawakami, Y., Murakami, Y., Hirano, S., and Kuratani, S.:
    "Heterotopic shift of epithelial-mesenchymal interactions for vertebrate jaw evolution."
    Science 296, 1316-1319 (2002).

Recent Research Results

Publications

Annual research report

Related Links

Lab Members

Principal investigator

Shigeru Kuratani
Chief Scientist

Core members

Rie Kusakabe
Research Scientist
Juan Pascual Anaya
Research Scientist
Masahiro Uesaka
Research Scientist
Takahiro Kohsokabe
Research Scientist
Shiro Egawa
Special Postdoctoral Researcher
Shunya Kuroda
Student Trainee
Tamami Hirai
Technical Staff I
Iori Sato
Technical Staff I
Fumiaki Sugahara
Visiting Scientist
Naoki Irie
Visiting Scientist
Tatsuya Hirasawa
Visiting Scientist

Contact Information

2-2-3 Minatojima-minamimachi, Chuo-ku
Kobe, Hyogo
650-0047 Japan
Email: saizo [at] cdb.riken.jp

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