David Christopher Evans (born 1980) is a

Canadian Canadians () are people identified with the country of Canada. This connection may be residential, legal, historical or cultural. For most Canadians, many (or all) of these connections exist and are collectively the source of their being ''C ...

palaeontologist Paleontology, also spelled as palaeontology or palæontology, is the scientific study of the life of the past, mainly but not exclusively through the study of fossils. Paleontologists use fossils as a means to classify organisms, measure geolo ...

and

evolutionary biologist Evolutionary biology is the subfield of biology that studies the evolutionary processes such as natural selection, common descent, and speciation that produced the diversity of life on Earth. In the 1930s, the discipline of evolutionary biol ...

who specializes in the evolution and paleobiology of

Cretaceous The Cretaceous ( ) is a geological period that lasted from about 143.1 to 66 mya (unit), million years ago (Mya). It is the third and final period of the Mesozoic Era (geology), Era, as well as the longest. At around 77.1 million years, it is the ...

dinosaur Dinosaurs are a diverse group of reptiles of the clade Dinosauria. They first appeared during the Triassic Geological period, period, between 243 and 233.23 million years ago (mya), although the exact origin and timing of the #Evolutio ...

s in western North America. He received his B.Sc. from the

University of British Columbia The University of British Columbia (UBC) is a Public university, public research university with campuses near University of British Columbia Vancouver, Vancouver and University of British Columbia Okanagan, Kelowna, in British Columbia, Canada ...

and his Ph.D. from the

University of Toronto The University of Toronto (UToronto or U of T) is a public university, public research university whose main campus is located on the grounds that surround Queen's Park (Toronto), Queen's Park in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. It was founded by ...

. He is a fellow of the

Royal Canadian Geographical Society The Royal Canadian Geographical Society (RCGS; French: ''Société géographique royale du Canada'') is a Canadian nonprofit educational organization. It has dedicated itself to spreading a broader knowledge and deeper appreciation of Canada, i ...

(RCGS) and a member of the

Royal Society of Canada The Royal Society of Canada (RSC; , SRC), also known as the Academies of Arts, Humanities, and Sciences of Canada (French: ''Académies des arts, des lettres et des sciences du Canada''), is the senior national, bilingual council of distinguishe ...

(The College of New Scholars, Artists and Scientists) and currently serves as the Senior Curator and Temerty Chair of Vertebrate Paleontology at the

Royal Ontario Museum The Royal Ontario Museum (ROM) is a museum of art, world culture and natural history in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. It is one of the largest museums in North America and the largest in Canada. It attracts more than one million visitors every year ...

Toronto Toronto ( , locally pronounced or ) is the List of the largest municipalities in Canada by population, most populous city in Canada. It is the capital city of the Provinces and territories of Canada, Canadian province of Ontario. With a p ...

, Canada. He is also a faculty member in the Department of Ecology & Evolutionary Biology at the University of Toronto. Evans is particularly renowned for his work on the paleobiology of

hadrosaur Hadrosaurids (), also hadrosaurs or duck-billed dinosaurs, are members of the ornithischian family Hadrosauridae. This group is known as the duck-billed dinosaurs for the flat duck-bill appearance of the bones in their snouts. The ornithopod fami ...

("duck-billed") dinosaurs and has conducted international research on a wide variety of paleontological topics.

Biography

David Evans was born in

Ontario Ontario is the southernmost Provinces and territories of Canada, province of Canada. Located in Central Canada, Ontario is the Population of Canada by province and territory, country's most populous province. As of the 2021 Canadian census, it ...

and raised in

Kelowna Kelowna ( ) is a city on Okanagan Lake in the Okanagan, Okanagan Valley in the British Columbia Interior, southern interior of British Columbia, Canada. It serves as the head office of the Regional District of Central Okanagan. The name Kelowna ...

British Columbia British Columbia is the westernmost Provinces and territories of Canada, province of Canada. Situated in the Pacific Northwest between the Pacific Ocean and the Rocky Mountains, the province has a diverse geography, with rugged landscapes that ...

. He received his B.Sc. from the Integrated Sciences Program of the University of British Columbia in 2003, where he completed an undergraduate thesis on skull growth and variation in the hadrosaur ''

Corythosaurus ''Corythosaurus'' (; ) is a genus of hadrosaurid "duck-billed" dinosaur from the Late Cretaceous Period (geology), period, about 77–75.7 million years ago, in what is now Laramidia, western North America. Its name is derived from the Anci ...

''. Over the course of his undergraduate degree, Evans worked as a field technician at the Royal Tyrell Museum of Palaeontology in

Drumheller Drumheller is a town on the Red Deer River in the badlands of east-central Alberta, Canada. It is located northeast of Calgary and south of Stettler. The Drumheller portion of the Red Deer River valley, often referred to as Dinosaur Vall ...

. He then completed his Ph.D. in 2007 under the supervision of Canadian paleontologist

Robert Reisz Robert Rafael Reisz is a Canadian paleontologist and specialist in the study of early amniote and tetrapod evolution. Research career Reisz received his B.Sc. (1969), M.Sc. (1971) and Ph.D. (1975) from McGill University as Robert L. Carroll's ...

at the University of Toronto in the Department of Ecology & Evolutionary Biology on development and phylogenetic relationships of

lambeosaurine Lambeosauridae /ˌlæmbiəˈsɔːraɪniː/ (meaning 'lambe's lizards') is an extinct group of crested hadrosauroid dinosaurs. Description Size Uncertainty surrounds the size of lambeosaurs from the European continent. Hadrosaurs found there, a ...

hadrosaurs (dissertation title: "Ontogeny and evolution of lambeosaurine dinosaurs (Ornithischia: Hadrosauridae)."). Following the completion of his Ph.D., Evans was hired as a curator by the Royal Ontario Museum in Toronto, Canada, where he currently serves as the Temerty Chair in Vertebrate Palaeontology. He has been part of the faculty in the Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology at the University of Toronto since 2007 and currently holds the rank of Associate Professor. He is also the owner of a male

Shiba Inu The is a breed of hunting dog from Japan. A small-to-medium breed, it is the smallest of the six original dog breeds native to Japan. The Shiba Inu was originally bred for hunting. Its name literally translates to "brushwood dog", as it is us ...

named Doug.

Academic contributions

David Evans' research focuses primarily on the evolution and paleobiology of Late Cretaceous dinosaurs, particularly in North American ecosystems. He has published extensively on various aspects of hadrosaurs, following his undergraduate and doctoral dissertations, including

phylogenetics In biology, phylogenetics () is the study of the evolutionary history of life using observable characteristics of organisms (or genes), which is known as phylogenetic inference. It infers the relationship among organisms based on empirical dat ...

, development,

biostratigraphy Biostratigraphy is the branch of stratigraphy which focuses on correlating and assigning relative ages of rock strata by using the fossil assemblages contained within them.Hine, Robert. "Biostratigraphy." ''Oxford Reference: Dictionary of Biology ...

, pathology, and anatomy. He has published more than 80 peer-reviewed articles and has several publications in leading scientific journals, including

Biological Reviews The Cambridge Philosophical Society (CPS) is a scientific society at the University of Cambridge. It was founded in 1819. The name derives from the medieval use of the word philosophy to denote any research undertaken outside the fields of law ...

Current Biology ''Current Biology'' is a biweekly peer-reviewed scientific journal that covers all areas of biology, especially molecular biology, cell biology, genetics, neurobiology, ecology, and evolutionary biology. The journal includes research artic ...

Methods in Ecology and Evolution ''Methods in Ecology and Evolution'' is a monthly peer-reviewed scientific journal covering methodologies in ecology and evolution. It was established in 2010 and is the 5th journal of the British Ecological Society. It is published by Wiley-Black ...

Nature Communications ''Nature Communications'' is a peer-reviewed, open access, scientific journal published by Nature Portfolio since 2010. It is a multidisciplinary journal that covers the natural sciences, including physics, chemistry, earth sciences, medic ...

Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences ''Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America'' (often abbreviated ''PNAS'' or ''PNAS USA'') is a peer-reviewed multidisciplinary scientific journal. It is the official journal of the National Academy of Scie ...

, Proceedings of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences, and

Science Science is a systematic discipline that builds and organises knowledge in the form of testable hypotheses and predictions about the universe. Modern science is typically divided into twoor threemajor branches: the natural sciences, which stu ...

, and has contributed book chapters to several edited volumes. Evans' current research interests focus primarily on the vast majority of the well-known Late Cretaceous dinosaur clades found in western North America, and he maintains active fieldwork programs in Alberta and Montana. He has also conducted research on dinosaur material from Mongolia and tetrapod-bearing deposits in Sudan. Evans has also been involved with both fieldwork and research of the

Early Jurassic The Early Jurassic Epoch (geology), Epoch (in chronostratigraphy corresponding to the Lower Jurassic series (stratigraphy), Series) is the earliest of three epochs of the Jurassic Period. The Early Jurassic starts immediately after the Triassic� ...

sauropodomorph Sauropodomorpha ( ; from Greek, meaning "lizard-footed forms") is an extinct clade of long-necked, herbivorous, saurischian dinosaurs that includes the sauropods and their ancestral relatives. Sauropods generally grew to very large sizes, had lo ...

Massospondylus ''Massospondylus'' ( ) is a genus of sauropodomorph dinosaur from the Early Jurassic of southern Africa. It was described by Sir Richard Owen in 1854 from remains discovered in South Africa, and is thus one of the first dinosaurs to have been ...

'' from South Africa and has conducted research on

pelycosaur Pelycosaur ( ) is an older term for basal or primitive Late Paleozoic synapsids, excluding the therapsids and their descendants. Previously, the term mammal-like reptile was used, and Pelycosauria was considered an order, but this is now thoug ...

ian-grade

Permian The Permian ( ) is a geologic period and System (stratigraphy), stratigraphic system which spans 47 million years, from the end of the Carboniferous Period million years ago (Mya), to the beginning of the Triassic Period 251.902 Mya. It is the s ...

synapsid Synapsida is a diverse group of tetrapod vertebrates that includes all mammals and their extinct relatives. It is one of the two major clades of the group Amniota, the other being the more diverse group Sauropsida (which includes all extant rept ...

s, Permian

temnospondyls Temnospondyli (from Greek τέμνειν, ''temnein'' 'to cut' and σπόνδυλος, ''spondylos'' 'vertebra') or temnospondyls is a diverse ancient order of small to giant tetrapods—often considered primitive amphibians—that flourished wo ...

, the iconic

Pleistocene The Pleistocene ( ; referred to colloquially as the ''ice age, Ice Age'') is the geological epoch (geology), epoch that lasted from to 11,700 years ago, spanning the Earth's most recent period of repeated glaciations. Before a change was fin ...

felid ''

Smilodon ''Smilodon'' is an extinct genus of Felidae, felids. It is one of the best known saber-toothed predators and prehistoric mammals. Although commonly known as the saber-toothed tiger, it was not closely related to the tiger or other modern cats ...

'', and choristoderes. Evans has been a part of various teams that have named over a dozen new

genera Genus (; : genera ) is a taxonomic rank above species and below family as used in the biological classification of living and fossil organisms as well as viruses. In binomial nomenclature, the genus name forms the first part of the binomial s ...

species A species () is often defined as the largest group of organisms in which any two individuals of the appropriate sexes or mating types can produce fertile offspring, typically by sexual reproduction. It is the basic unit of Taxonomy (biology), ...

of dinosaurs. New

ceratopsia Ceratopsia or Ceratopia ( or ; Ancient Greek, Greek: "horned faces") is a group of herbivore, herbivorous, beaked dinosaurs that thrived in what are now North America, Asia and Europe, during the Cretaceous Period (geology), Period, although ance ...

ns named by Evans and colleagues include '' Xenoceratops foremostensis'' Ryan, Evans, & Shepherd, 2012; '' Gryphoceratops morrisoni'' Ryan, Evans, Currie, Brown, & Brinkman, 2012; '' Unescoceratops koppelhusi'' Ryan, Evans, Currie, Brown, & Brinkman, 2012; ''

Mercuriceratops gemini ''Mercuriceratops'' is an extinct genus of herbivorous chasmosaurine ceratopsid dinosaur known from the Late Cretaceous (Campanian stage) of Alberta, Canada and Montana, United States. It contains a single species, ''Mercuriceratops gemini''. D ...

'' Ryan, Evans, Loewen, & Currie, 2014; '' Wendiceratops pinhorensis'' Evans & Ryan, 2015; ''

Spiclypeus shipporum ''Spiclypeus'' (meaning "spike shield") is an extinct genus of chasmosaurine ceratopsian dinosaur known from the Late Cretaceous Judith River Formation (late Campanian stage) of Montana, United States. Discovery In 2000, Bill D. Shipp, a nuclea ...

'' Mallon, Ott, Larson, Iuliano, & Evans, 2016; '' Ferrisaurus sustutensis'' Arbour & Evans, 2019; and ''Stellasaurus ancellae'' Wilson, Ryan & Evans, 2020. Evans was also involved in the naming of the

ornithopods Ornithopoda () is a clade of ornithischian dinosaurs, called ornithopods (). They represent one of the most successful groups of herbivore, herbivorous dinosaurs during the Cretaceous. The most primitive members of the group were bipedal and rel ...

'' Albertadromeus syntarsus'' Brown, Evans, Ryan, & Russell, 2013; ''

Plesiohadros djadokhtaensis ''Plesiohadros'' (meaning "near to hadrosaurids") is an extinct genus of hadrosauroid dinosaur. It is known from a partial skeleton including the skull collected at Alag Teg locality, from the Campanian Alagteeg Formation of southern Mongolia. Th ...

'' Tsogtbaatar, Weishampel, Evans, & Watabe, 2014; and '' Gobihadros mongoliensis'' Tsogtbaatar, Weishampel, Evans, & Watabe, 2019; the

pachycephalosauria Pachycephalosauria (; from Greek παχυκεφαλόσαυρος for 'thick headed lizards') is a clade of ornithischian dinosaurs. Along with Ceratopsia, it makes up the clade Marginocephalia. With the exception of two species, most pachyceph ...

ns ''

Acrotholus audeti ''Acrotholus'' (Greek for "highest dome"- akros meaning highest and tholos meaning dome) is an extinct genus of pachycephalosaur dinosaur that lived during the Santonian of the late Cretaceous, in the Milk River Formation of Canada. The type spec ...

'' Evans, Schott, Larson, Brown, & Ryan, 2013; and '' Foraminacephale brevis'' Schott & Evans, 2016; the

dromaeosaurid Dromaeosauridae () is a family (biology), family of feathered coelurosaurian Theropoda, theropod dinosaurs. They were generally small to medium-sized feathered carnivores that flourished in the Cretaceous period (geology), Period. The name Drom ...

'' Acheroraptor temertyorum'' Evans, Currie, & Larson, 2013; the

ankylosaurid Ankylosauridae () is a family of armored dinosaurs within Ankylosauria, and is the sister group to Nodosauridae. The oldest known ankylosaurids date to around 122 million years ago and went extinct 66 million years ago during the Cretaceous–Pal ...

'' Zuul crurivastator'' Arbour & Evans, 2017; the

troodontid Troodontidae is a clade of bird-like theropod dinosaurs from the Late Jurassic to Late Cretaceous. During most of the 20th century, troodontid fossils were few and incomplete and they have therefore been allied, at various times, with many dinos ...

'' Albertavenator curriei'' Evans, Cullen, Larson, & Rego, 2017; and ''Sinocephale bexelli'' Evans, Brown, You, & Campione, 2021. Evans has also been involved with the naming of various new non-dinosaurian taxa, such as the

Devonian The Devonian ( ) is a period (geology), geologic period and system (stratigraphy), system of the Paleozoic era (geology), era during the Phanerozoic eon (geology), eon, spanning 60.3 million years from the end of the preceding Silurian per ...

onychodontiform Onychodontiformes (also known as Onychodontida and Struniiformes) is an order of prehistoric sarcopterygian fish that lived during the Devonian period. The onychodontiforms are generally regarded as early-diverging members of the coelacanth linea ...

fish ''Onychodus eriensis'' Mann, Rudkin, Evans, & Laflamme, 2017; the

Carboniferous The Carboniferous ( ) is a Geologic time scale, geologic period and System (stratigraphy), system of the Paleozoic era (geology), era that spans 60 million years, from the end of the Devonian Period Ma (million years ago) to the beginning of the ...

parareptile Parareptilia ("near-reptiles") is an extinct group of Basal (phylogenetics), basal Sauropsida, sauropsids ("Reptile, reptiles"), traditionally considered the sister taxon to Eureptilia (the group that likely contains all living reptiles and birds ...

'' Erpetonyx arsenaultorum'' Modesto, Scott, MacDougall, Sues, Evans, & Reisz, 2015; the Cretaceous

baenid Baenidae is an extinct family of paracryptodiran turtles known from the Early Cretaceous to Eocene of North America. While during the Early Cretaceous they are found across North America, during the Late Cretaceous they are only found in Laramidi ...

turtle Turtles are reptiles of the order (biology), order Testudines, characterized by a special turtle shell, shell developed mainly from their ribs. Modern turtles are divided into two major groups, the Pleurodira (side necked turtles) and Crypt ...

''Neurankylus lithographicus'' Larson, Longrich, Evans, & Ryan, 2013; and the Cretaceous

dyrosaurid Dyrosauridae is a family (biology), family of extinct neosuchian crocodyliforms that lived from the Campanian to the Eocene. Dyrosaurid fossils are globally distributed, having been found in Africa, Asia, Europe, North America and South America. ...

crocodilian ''Brachiosuchus kababishensis'' Salih, Evans, Bussert, Klein & Müller, 2021. As a professor at the University of Toronto, Evans supervises numerous graduate students in the Department of Ecology & Evolutionary Biology. Former M.Sc. students include Arjan Mann (

National Museum of Natural History The National Museum of Natural History (NMNH) is a natural history museum administered by the Smithsonian Institution, located on the National Mall in Washington, D.C., United States. It has free admission and is open 364 days a year. With 4.4 ...

); Ryan Schott (

); Chris McGarrity (

Field Museum The Field Museum of Natural History (FMNH), also known as The Field Museum, is a natural history museum in Chicago, Illinois, and is one of the largest such museums in the world. The museum is popular for the size and quality of its educationa ...

); Collin Van Buren (

Ohio State University The Ohio State University (Ohio State or OSU) is a public university, public Land-grant university, land-grant research university in Columbus, Ohio, United States. A member of the University System of Ohio, it was founded in 1870. It is one ...

); and Denise Maranga. Former Ph.D. students include Nicolas Campione (

University of New England University of New England may refer to: * University of New England (Australia), in New South Wales, with about 26,000 students * University of New England (United States), in Biddeford, Maine, with about 6,000 students See also * New England Coll ...

); Caleb Brown ( Royal Tyrell Museum); Kirstin Brink (

University of Manitoba The University of Manitoba (U of M, UManitoba, or UM) is a public research university in Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada. Founded in 1877, it is the first university of Western Canada. Both by total student enrolment and campus area, the University of ...

); Thomas Cullen (

Carleton University Carleton University is an English-language public university, public research university in Ottawa, Ontario, Canada. Founded in 1942 as Carleton College, the institution originally operated as a private, non-denominational evening college to se ...

); Mateusz Wosik (

Misericordia University Misericordia University is a private Catholic university in the Dallas, Pennsylvania area, United States. It was founded by the Religious Sisters of Mercy in 1924 as College Misericordia; in 2007 it became a university and changed its name. ...

), Kentaro Chiba (

Okayama University of Science is a private university in Okayama, Okayama, Japan, established in 1964. It is predominantly a school of science and engineering. Notable events From 2015–2018, Okayama University of Science's operator, the group Kake Gakuen, applied for ...

), and D. Cary Woodruff ( Great Plains Dinosaur Museum). Evans also serves on the editorial board of several academic journals, including FACETS and Biology Letters, and has previously served as an editor at PLOS ONE.

Outreach and public media

Evans has been featured in numerous documentaries, including the History Channel's 2015 documentary ''Dino Hunt Canada'' and various episodes of

Daily Planet The ''Daily Planet'' is a fictional newspaper appearing in American comic books published by DC Comics, commonly in association with Superman. The newspaper was first mentioned in ''Action Comics'' #9 (November 13, 1939) – Underworld Politics ...

and radio and TV interviews, as well as appeared in the

TVOKids TVOKids (stylized as tvokids) is the brand for most of the children's programming aired by TVO (formerly TVOntario) in Canada Canada is a country in North America. Its Provinces and territories of Canada, ten provinces and three ter ...

shows Now You Know, Canada Crew,

Dino Dana ''Dino Dana'' is a Canadian comedy-drama science fiction television series created and directed by J. J. Johnson. The series was developed as a follow-up to '' Dino Dan: Trek's Adventures'' and premiered on Amazon Prime Video on May 27, 2017. ' ...

& ''Dino Dan: Trek's Adventures''. He has also appeared in Dino Dana: The Movie. On top of that, he has helped to develop several exhibits, including the traveling "Ultimate Dinosaurs" exhibit in 2012, the permanent James and Louise Temerty Galleries of the Age of Dinosaurs at the Royal Ontario Museum (ROM), and temporary exhibits at the ROM, including "Dinosaur Eggs & Babies: Remarkable Fossils from South Africa" (2014) and "Zuul, Life of an Armoured Dinosaur" (2018-2019). Evans has also served on numerous committees of the

Society of Vertebrate Paleontology The Society of Vertebrate Paleontology (SVP) is a professional organization that was founded in the United States in 1940 to advance the science of vertebrate paleontology around the world. Mission and activities SVP has about 2,300 members inte ...

and the Canadian Society of Vertebrate Paleontology.

References

External links

Lab website

Royal Ontario Museum staff page
* {{DEFAULTSORT:Evans, David C. 1980 births Living people Canadian paleontologists Paleontology in Alberta Royal Ontario Museum University of Toronto alumni Canadian evolutionary biologists 21st-century Canadian biologists