Professor of Biology, Professor of Medical Science

Overview

NO LONGER ACCEPTING GRADUATE APPLICATIONS

My background is in biology, paleontology, and art. I was an undergraduate at Colgate University (B.A., 1983) before a year-long Watson Fellowship studying dinosaurs in European museums. At Harvard (Ph.D. 1989) I did X-ray and muscle activity studies of alligators and birds to explore the evolution of hind limb function in bipedal, meat-eating dinosaurs (theropods). I received postdoctoral training in nerve-muscle development at Emory University, bird flight at the University of Montana, and avian embryology at Harvard before joining the faculty at Wake Forest University. Since 1995 I've been a professor at Brown, where I teach human anatomy to medical students. My research uses 3-D animation tools to reconstruct dinosaur foot movements based on fossil tracks, to measure skeletal motion in walking and flying birds, and to find new ways to study locomotor evolution. I strive to be a bridge between biologists exclusively studying living animals and paleontologists working solely with fossils.

Brown Affiliations

Research Areas