Professor Craig Fletcher, PhD, DVM, serves as the Associate Vice Chancellor for Research, Professor for Pathology and Laboratory Medicine and also serves as Director of the Division of Comparative Medicine, where he serves as the university attending veterinarian, manages the university program for laboratory animal care and housing, serves as a member of the Institutional Animal Care and Use Committee, and participates in educational and research program activities, within the School of Medicine at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill (UNC). In his role, Fletcher advises the Vice Chancellor for Research on strategic planning for research involving animals and participates in the design of new research and administrative initiatives and strategies.
Fletcher research focuses on veterinary pathology, animal models of disease, immunology, and vascular biology. His Clinical interests include laboratory, exotic, and companion animal medicine, the regulations and policies governing the humane care and use of animals used in research and education, and in providing veterinary consultation to principal investigators in development of grant application utilizing vertebrate animals.
Dr. Fletcher holds a Bachelor of Science degree in Laboratory Animal Science from North Carolina Agriculture & Technical State University. He pursued his Doctorate in Veterinary Medicine at the University of Florida and later earned a Ph.D. in Infectious Disease from Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, with a focus on advancing HIV therapeutics. Following his doctoral studies, Dr. Fletcher undertook post-doctoral fellowship positions at Johns Hopkins University medical school. He then transitioned to a faculty role within the Department of Molecular and Comparative Pathobiology before joining the esteemed faculty of the Department of Pathology and Laboratory Medicine at UNC in 2009.