K. Christopher Beard

K. Christopher Beard is an American paleontologist, an expert on the primate fossil record and a 2000 MacArthur Fellowship "Genius" Award Winner. Beard's research is reshaping critical debates about the evolutionary origins of mammals, including primates, routinely questioning current thinking about their geographical origins.[1] Dr. Beard is the former Curator of the Carnegie Museum of Natural History,[2] and Mary R. Dawson Chair of Vertebrate Paleontology, at University of Pittsburgh.[3] He is currently Distinguished Foundation Professor, Senior Curator at the University of Kansas.[4] He was co-author with Dan Gebo about an extinct primate from China.[5] Dr. Beard also authored the book The Hunt for the Dawn Monkey: Unearthing the Origins of Monkeys, Apes and Humans.[1] Beard was also part of the research teams that discovered Teilhardina, the earliest primate ever found in North America, and Eosimias, one of the earliest higher primates yet discovered.[1] He worked with NASA to scan a Tyrannosaurus rex skull.[6] Beard received his PhD from the Functional Anatomy and Evolution Program at Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine in 1989.[1]

  1. ^ a b c d Science
  2. ^ "CMNH Vertebrate Paleontology: K. Christopher Beard". Archived from the original on 2010-07-03. Retrieved 2010-04-22.
  3. ^ "People | Department of Geology and Environmental Science | University of Pittsburgh | University of Pittsburgh".
  4. ^ "K. Christopher Beard | Department of Ecology & Evolutionary Biology". eeb.ku.edu. Archived from the original on 2014-05-22.
  5. ^ "Newly discovered fossils from China shed light on common ancestry of monkeys, apes and humans". Archived from the original on 2010-04-10. Retrieved 2010-04-22.
  6. ^ "NASA - No Bones About It: NASA Analyzes Prehistoric Predator from the Past".