Derek Briggs

Derek Briggs is an Irish paleontologist based at Yale University, USA. Whilst at Cambridge University, he worked on the fossils of the Cambrian Burgess Shale of British Columbia, along with Harry Blackmore Whittington and Simon Conway Morris. The Burgess Shale project subsequently became one of the most celebrated endeavors in the field of paleontology in the latter half of the 20th century. He is currently Director of the Yale Institute for Biospheric Studies, Professor in the Department of Geology and Geophysics and Curator in charge of Invertebrate Paleontology at the Peabody Museum. He is a Fellow of the Royal Society.

Briggs’s research is on the preservation and evolutionary significance of exceptionally preserved fossil biotas. This involves a range of approaches from experimental work on the factors controlling decay and fossilisation, through studies of early diagenetic mineralisation and organic preservation, to field work on a range of extraordinary fossil occurrences.

Biography

Date	Position
1974-1977	Research Fellow, Sidney Sussex College, University of Cambridge
1977 - 1985	Department of Geology, Goldsmith's College, University of London.
1985 - 2002	Department of Earth Sciences, University of Bristol (Chair 1997 - 2001)
2001 - 2002	Visiting professor, Department of Geophysical Sciences, University of Chicago
2003 -	Professor in the Department of Geology and Geophysics and Curator in charge of Invertebrate Paleontology at the Peabody Museum.
2004-	Director of the Yale Institute for Biospheric Studies