Richard Fortey
| Richard Alan Fortey | |
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Fortey in Adelaide, South Australia, 2014
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| Born | 15 February 1946 |
| Fields | Paleontology |
| Institutions |
University of Cambridge Natural History Museum |
| Notable awards | Frink Medal (2000) Fellow of the Royal Society Michael Faraday Prize (2006) Linnean Medal (2006) |
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Website www |
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Richard Alan Fortey FRS FRSL (born 15 February 1946 in London) is a British palaeontologist, natural historian, writer and television presenter. He served as President of the Geological Society of London for its bicentennial year of 2007. Fortey is married and has four children.
Fortey was educated at Ealing Grammar School for Boys and King's College, Cambridge, where he read Natural Sciences, specialising in geology. He received a PhD and DSc from the University of Cambridge.
Fortey has had a long career as a palaeontologist at the Natural History Museum in London. Fortey’s research interests include, above all, trilobites. At the age of 14, he discovered his first trilobite, sparking a passionate interest that later became a career. He has named numerous trilobite species and still continues his research despite having retired from the Museum.
He studies trilobites and graptolites, especially those from the Ordovician, and their systematics, evolution and modes of life. He is also involved in research on Ordovician palaeogeography and correlation; arthropod evolution, especially the origin of major groups; and the relationships between divergence times as revealed by molecular evidence and the fossil record. Fortey’s scientific output includes over 250 papers on trilobites, Ordovician stratigraphy and palaeogeography.
He is the author of popular science books on a range of subjects including geology, palaeontology, evolution and natural history.
Since 2012, Fortey has also been a television presenter appearing on BBC Four presenting natural history programmes.
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