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Michael Benton

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Michael Benton
OBEFRSFRSE
Michael Benton at theRoyal Societyadmissions day in London in 2014
Born
Michael James Benton

(1956-04-08)8 April 1956(age 68)[2]
Scotland
NationalityBritish
EducationRobert Gordon's College
Alma mater
Known forBentonyx
AwardsLyell Medal(2005)
Scientific career
Fields
InstitutionsUniversity of Bristol
ThesisThe Triassic reptile Hyperodapedon from Elgin, functional morphology and relationships(1981)
Websitewww.bristol.ac.uk/earthsciences/people/mike-j-benton

Michael James BentonOBEFRSFRSE[3][4](born 8 April 1956[2]) is a British palaeontologist, and professor ofvertebrate palaeontologyin the School of Earth Sciences at theUniversity of Bristol.[5][6][7]His published work has mostly concentrated on the evolution ofTriassicreptilesbut he has also worked onextinction eventsand faunal changes in the fossil record.[1][8][9]

Education

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Benton was educated atRobert Gordon's College,[citation needed]theUniversity of Aberdeen[2]andNewcastle Universitywhere he was awarded aPhDin 1981.[10][11]

Research and career

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Benton's research investigatespalaeobiology,palaeontology,andmacroevolution.[1][12][13]His research interests include: diversification of life, quality of the fossil record, shapes of phylogenies, age-clade congruence, mass extinctions,[14]Triassic ecosystem evolution, basal diapsidphylogeny,basalarchosaurs,and the origin of the dinosaurs. He has made fundamental contributions to understanding the history of life, particularly concerning how biodiversity changes through time.[3]He has led in integrating data from living and fossil organisms to generate phylogenies – solutions to the question of how major groups originated and diversified through time.[3]This approach has revolutionised the understanding of major questions, including the relative roles of internal and external drivers on the history of life, whether diversity reaches saturation, the significance of mass extinctions, and how major clades radiate.[3]A key theme is thePermian–Triassic extinction event,the largest mass extinction of all time, which took place over 250 million years ago, where he investigates how life was able to recover from such a devastating event.[3]

Benton is the author of several palaeontology text books (e.g.Vertebrate Palaeontology) and children's books on the theme of dinosaurs.[15]His work has been published in a variety of journals.[1][16][17][18][19]Benton has also advised on many media productions including BBC'sWalking with Dinosaursand was a programme consultant forPaleoworldonDiscovery Science.He also contributed to the 2002BBCprogrammeThe Day The Earth Nearly Died,which featured scientists and dealt with the mysteries of thePermian extinction.

In December 2010, Benton had arhynchosaur(Bentonyx) named in his honour.[20]

Benton founded theMaster of Sciencedegree programme in Palaeobiology at Bristol in 1996, from which more than 300 students have graduated.[3]He has supervised more than 50 PhD students.[3]

As the Initiator of theBristol Dinosaur ProjectBenton was also involved with creating and designing the website for the project.[21]

Publications

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  • Dinosaurs an A-Z Guide(1988, Kingfisher)ISBN978-0862723859
  • The phylogeny and classification of the tetrapods(1998, ed. Volumes 1 and 2)[ISBN missing]
  • Prehistoric Animals(1989, Kingfisher)ISBN978-0862724580
  • Vertebrate Palaeontology(4th edition, 2014, Wiley-Blackwell)ISBN978-1118407554
  • On the trail of the dinosaur(1989, Quarto Publishing)ISBN0-517-67976-0
  • The reign of the reptiles(1991)[ISBN missing]
  • The rise of the mammals(1991)[ISBN missing]
  • The fossil record 2(1993, ed.)[ISBN missing]
  • Dinosaur and Other Prehistoric Animal Fact Finder(1993)[ISBN missing]
  • Fossil reptiles of Great Britain(1995, with P. S. Spencer)[ISBN missing]
  • The Viking atlas of evolution(1997, with R. Osborne)[ISBN missing]
  • The Penguin historical atlas of the dinosaurs(1997)[ISBN missing]
  • Basic Palaeontology(1997, withD. A. T. Harper)ISBN0-582-22857-3
  • Walking with dinosaurs: the facts(2000)ISBN0-563-53744-2
  • The age of dinosaurs in Russia and Mongolia(2000, ed., with D. M. Unwin, M. A. Shishkin and E. N. Kurochkin)[ISBN missing]
  • Permian and Triassic red beds and the Penarth Group of Great Britain(2002, with E. Cook and P. J. Turner)[ISBN missing]
  • When life nearly died: the greatest mass extinction of all time(1st edition, 2003; 2nd edition, 2008)[22]
  • Mesozoic and Tertiary fossil mammals and birds of Great Britain(2005, with L. Cook, D. Schreve, A Currant, and J. J. Hooker)ISBN9781861074805
  • Introduction to Paleobiology and the Fossil Record(2009, with David A.T Harper)ISBN9781405141574
  • The first four billion yearsBenton, Michael J. (2009)."Paleontology and the History of Life".In Michael Ruse; Joseph Travis (eds.).Evolution: The First Four Billion Years.Cambridge, Massachusetts: The Belknap Press of Harvard University Press. pp.80–104.ISBN978-0-674-03175-3.
  • The Dinosaurs Rediscovered: How a Scientific Revolution is Rewriting History,(2019)ISBN978-0500052006
  • Dinosaurs: New Visions of a Lost World(2021)ISBN9780500052198
  • Extinctions: How Life Survives, Adapts and Evolves(2023)ISBN9780500025468
  • Dinosaur Behavior: An Illustrated Guide(2023)ISBN9780691244297

Honours and awards

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Benton was elected aFellow of the Royal Society(FRS) in 2014 for "substantial contributions to the improvement of natural knowledge"[3]and aFellow of the Royal Society of Edinburgh(FRSE).[when?]

He was appointedOfficer of the Order of the British Empire(OBE) in the2021 Birthday Honoursfor services to palaeontology and community engagement.[23]

References

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  1. ^abcdMichael Bentonpublications indexed byGoogle ScholarEdit this at Wikidata
  2. ^abcdAnon (2015)."Benton, Prof. Michael James".Who's Who(onlineOxford University Pressed.). A & C Black.doi:10.1093/ww/9780199540884.013.U43387.(Subscription orUK public library membershiprequired.)
  3. ^abcdefghAnon (2014)."Professor Michael Benton FRS".royalsociety.org.London:Royal Society.One or more of the preceding sentences incorporates text from the royalsociety.org website where:

    "All text published under the heading 'Biography' on Fellow profile pages is available underCreative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.”--Royal Society Terms, conditions and policiesat theWayback Machine(archived 2016-11-11)
  4. ^"Home – The Royal Society of Edinburgh"(PDF).The Royal Society of Edinburgh.20 June 2016. Archived fromthe original(PDF)on 17 May 2011.Retrieved28 August2018.
  5. ^Liz Loeffler."People: Earth Sciences: University of Bristol".bris.ac.uk.
  6. ^Official websiteEdit this at Wikidata
  7. ^"Professor Mike Benton – School of Earth Sciences".Bristol.ac.uk.Retrieved28 August2018.
  8. ^Benton, M. J. (2009). "The Red Queen and the Court Jester: Species diversity and the role of biotic and abiotic factors through time".Science.323(5915): 728–32.Bibcode:2009Sci...323..728B.doi:10.1126/science.1157719.PMID19197051.S2CID206512702.
  9. ^Lloyd, G. T.; Davis, K. E.; Pisani, D.; Tarver, J. E.; Ruta, M.; Sakamoto, M.; Hone, D. W. E.; Jennings, R.; Benton, M. J. (2008)."Dinosaurs and the Cretaceous Terrestrial Revolution".Proceedings of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences.275(1650): 2483–90.doi:10.1098/rspb.2008.0715.PMC2603200.PMID18647715.
  10. ^Benton, Michael James (1981).The Triassic reptile Hyperodapedon from Elgin, functional morphology and relationships.jisc.ac.uk(PhD thesis). University of Newcastle upon Tyne.EThOSuk.bl.ethos.238091.
  11. ^Benton, Michael James (1983). "The Triassic Reptile Hyperodapedon from Elgin: Functional Morphology and Relationships".Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences.302(1112): 605–718.Bibcode:1983RSPTB.302..605B.doi:10.1098/rstb.1983.0079.ISSN0962-8436.
  12. ^Benton, M. J.; Emerson, B. C. (2007). "How Did Life Become So Diverse? The Dynamics of Diversification According to the Fossil Record and Molecular Phylogenetics".Palaeontology.50(1): 23–40.Bibcode:2007Palgy..50...23B.doi:10.1111/j.1475-4983.2006.00612.x.
  13. ^Benton, M. J.;Donoghue, P. C. J.(2006)."Paleontological Evidence to Date the Tree of Life".Molecular Biology and Evolution.24(1): 26–53.doi:10.1093/molbev/msl150.PMID17047029.
  14. ^World Archipelago."Macmillan".macmillan.
  15. ^"Thames & Hudson Publishers – Essential illustrated art books – Michael J. Benton".thamesandhudson.Archived fromthe originalon 15 April 2010.
  16. ^Sahney, S.; Benton, M. J.; Falcon-Lang, H. J. (2010). "Rainforest collapse triggered Carboniferous tetrapod diversification in Euramerica".Geology.38(12): 1079–1082.Bibcode:2010Geo....38.1079S.doi:10.1130/G31182.1.
  17. ^Sahney, S; Benton, M. J.; Ferry, P. A. (2010)."Links between global taxonomic diversity, ecological diversity and the expansion of vertebrates on land".Biology Letters.6(4): 544–7.doi:10.1098/rsbl.2009.1024.PMC2936204.PMID20106856.
  18. ^Sahney, S; Benton, M. J. (2008)."Recovery from the most profound mass extinction of all time".Proceedings of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences.275(1636): 759–65.doi:10.1098/rspb.2007.1370.PMC2596898.PMID18198148.
  19. ^"Search".Archived fromthe originalon 8 January 2015.Retrieved23 October2017.
  20. ^"Bristol University – Alumni and friends – 2011: Introducing Bentonyx".bristol.ac.uk.15 January 2024.
  21. ^"The Bristol Dinosaur Project - Department of Earth Sciences, University of Bristol".30 September 2011. Archived fromthe originalon 30 September 2011.Retrieved19 February2023.
  22. ^Bowler, P. J. (2003)."Suffocated or shot?".Nature.423(6938): 384.Bibcode:2003Natur.423..384B.doi:10.1038/423384a.Review ofWhen Life Nearly Died: The Greatest Mass Extinction of All Time
  23. ^"No. 63377".The London Gazette(Supplement). 12 June 2021. p. B11.

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