The Rise and Reign of the Mammals
WEBINAR
22nd November 2023 16:00 GMT
by Professor Steve Brusatte
(University of Edinburgh)
Abstract
Stretch back 325 million years to follow our mammalian forebears as they persevere in the shadow of the dinosaurs, survive the worst day in the history of Earth, and then rapidly diversify and claim the world as their own. From woolly mammoths and sabre-toothed tigers and countless spectacular extinct species, and eventually the 6000+ species of mammals that rule the Earth today, including ourselves. Professor Steve Brusatte of the University of Edinburgh, author of the pop science book The Rise and Reign of the mammals, reveals new fossil finds and technologies that are allowing us to understand the evolution of mammals in unprecedented detail. By doing so, he uncovers how our single human species is affecting the world like no mammal before, and if things continue at the current pace, more than half of all mammal species may succumb to extinction. Now at the most perilous point in mammal history since our ancestors stared down the asteroid, the lecture builds an understanding and revelling in our history, enabling us to make a better future.
Biography
Professor Steve Brusatte is a palaeontologist on the faculty of the School of GeoSciences at the University of Edinburgh in Scotland. He grew up in the Midwestern United States and has a MSc in Palaeobiology from the University of Bristol, and PhD in Earth and Environmental Sciences from Columbia University in New York.
Steve is widely recognized as one of the leading palaeontologists of his generation. He has written over one hundred and fifty peer-reviewed scientific papers during his 15 years of research in the field, named and described over a dozen new species of dinosaurs and mammals, and led ground-breaking studies on how dinosaurs rose to dominance and went extinct and how mammals replaced them. His latest book published in 2022 The Rise and Reign of the Mammals is the focus of this talk and his recent research on how the mammals replaced the dinosaurs following the K-T extinction event. His 2018 book, The Rise and Fall of the Dinosaurs was a Sunday Times bestseller, and he was the science consultant for Jurassic World, Dominion, the latest film in the Jurassic Park franchise.