Winter Lecture: Uncovering the evolutionary secrets of fossil mammals

Join us for the March Winter Lecture to uncover the evolutionary secrets of fossil mammals.

Thanks to Jurassic Park, Walking with Dinosaurs and other computer-generated imagery, we are familiar with prehistoric animals brought to life on television and cinema screens. But how do scientists know anything about how these animals moved, fed and sensed their environments?

In this talk Professor Emily Rayfield will explore how far palaeontologists can go in reconstructing the behaviour of extinct animals. Drawing on evidence from fossils found both locally and in southern Brazil, alongside X-ray imaging and techniques co-opted from engineering, she will show how scientists uncover the lives of long-extinct creatures. Focussing on the earliest fossil representatives of our own lineage, the mammals, this illustrated lecture will demonstrate how exceptionally preserved fossils and cutting-edge analytical methods are helping us understand the evolution of key features that define us as mammals – specialised jaws and teeth, large brains and high-frequency hearing.

Speaker

Emily Rayfield is Professor of Palaeobiology in the School of Earth Sciences, University of Bristol. She leads a research group of students, postdoctoral researchers and fellows who study the function and evolution of living and extinct animals using X-rays, biomechanical and engineering analysis, and teaches palaeontology and evolution to Bristol University students.

How to take part

Thanks to the generous sponsorship from the Friends of Bristol Museums, Galleries & Archives.