DinoFest 2017 Speaker: Dr. Lindsay Zanno
Keynote Lecture — 12 p.m.
"Fearsome Continent: New Discoveries Reveal the Lost Cretaceous Worlds of North America"
Join keynote speaker Dr. Lindsay Zanno as she reveals her team’s latest dinosaur discoveries and explores their struggle for survival at the dawn of the Late Cretaceous in North America.
Dr. Lindsay Zanno is head and curator of paleontology at the North Carolina Museum of Natural Sciences and an assistant research professor at North Carolina State University.
Zanno received a B.S. in biological anthropology from the University of New Mexico (summa cum laude, 1999), a M.S. in geology (2004), and a Ph.D. in geology (2008) from the University of Utah. Her main research interest is the evolution of theropod dinosaurs—a group that includes the iconic megapredator T. rex, as well as living birds.
Despite more than 17 years of international expedition experience, Zanno has a soft spot for the American West from where she has described many new species, including Siats meekerorum, one of the largest meat-eating dinosaurs discovered on the continent.
Zanno’s work garners worldwide media attention and has been featured extensively by notables such as the Science Channel, History Channel, National Geographic, New York Times, NPR, and the BBC. She was recently featured as a Science Advocate for Walking With Dinosaurs — The Arena Spectacular and currently serves as a scientific board member for The Jurassic Foundation and coordinator for several paleontology-focused citizen science and STEM education projects.
In 2012, Zanno launched a real-time social media platform, Expedition Live!, which connects the public with paleontologists in the field. Her published impact ranges from top science journals such as Nature, regular Tweets, more than 100 technical works, and a children’s book on the cycle of life.