Kirk J. Fitzhugh is the

curator A curator (from , meaning 'to take care') is a manager or overseer. When working with cultural organizations, a curator is typically a "collections curator" or an "exhibitions curator", and has multifaceted tasks dependent on the particular ins ...

at the

Natural History Museum of Los Angeles County Nature is an inherent character or constitution, particularly of the ecosphere or the universe as a whole. In this general sense nature refers to the laws, elements and phenomena of the physical world, including life. Although humans are par ...

, a position he has held since 1990. His research focuses on the

systematics Systematics is the study of the diversification of living forms, both past and present, and the relationships among living things through time. Relationships are visualized as evolutionary trees (synonyms: phylogenetic trees, phylogenies). Phy ...

polychaete Polychaeta () is a paraphyletic class of generally marine Annelid, annelid worms, common name, commonly called bristle worms or polychaetes (). Each body segment has a pair of fleshy protrusions called parapodia that bear many bristles, called c ...

s and on the

philosophical Philosophy ('love of wisdom' in Ancient Greek) is a systematic study of general and fundamental questions concerning topics like existence, reason, knowledge, Value (ethics and social sciences), value, mind, and language. It is a rational an ...

foundations of

evolutionary theory Evolution is the change in the heritable characteristics of biological populations over successive generations. It occurs when evolutionary processes such as natural selection and genetic drift act on genetic variation, resulting in certai ...

. Fitzhugh is a critic of DNA barcoding methods as a technical substitute for systematics. He attends

Willi Hennig Society The Willi Hennig Society "was founded in 1980 with the expressed purpose of promoting the field of phylogenetic systematics." The society is represented by phylogenetic systematists managing and publishing in the peer-reviewed journal titled ''Cl ...

meetings where he has argued that "

synapomorphy In phylogenetics, an apomorphy (or derived trait) is a novel Phenotypic trait, character or character state that has evolution, evolved from its ancestral form (or Plesiomorphy and symplesiomorphy, plesiomorphy). A synapomorphy is an apomorphy sh ...

as evidence does not meet the scientific standard of independence...a particularly serious challenge to phylogenetic systematics, because it denies that the most severely tested and least disconfirmed cladogram can also maximize explanatory power." His graduate supervisor was V. A. Funk, from the U.S. National Herbarium, National Museum of Natural History, Smithsonian Institution MRC. He completed his doctoral thesis on Systematics and phylogeny of Sabellid polychaetes in 1988 while he was a research scientist at the LA County museum. He married a lawyer named Nancy E. Gold in 1989.

Publications

*Fitzhugh, K. (1989). "A systematic revision of the Sabellidae-Caobangiidae-Sabellongidae complex (Annelida, Polychaeta)." Bull. Am. Mus. Nat. Hist. 192: 1-104 *Fitzhugh, K. (1990). "Two new genera of the subfamily Fabriciinae (Polychaeta, Sabellidae)." American Museum Novitates 2967: 1-19 *Fitzhugh, K. (1990) Fabricinuda, a new genus of Fabriciinae (Polychaeta: Sabellidae). Proc. Biol. Soc. Wash. 103: 161-178. *Fitzhugh, K. (1990). "A revision of the genus ''Fabricia'' blainville, 1828 (polychaeta: sabellidae: fabriciinae)." Sarsia 75(1):1-16 *Fitzhugh, K. (1990). "Two new genera of the subfamily Fabriciinae (Polychaeta: Sabellidae)." Am. Mus. Novitates 2967: 1-19. *Fitzhugh, K. (1990). "Revision of the Fabriciinae genus ''Fabriciola'' Friedrich, 1939 (Polychaeta: Sabellidae)." Zool. Scr. 19: 153-164. *Fitzhugh, K. (1990). "Revision of the Fabriciinae genus ''Augeneriella'' Banse, 1957 (Polychaeta: Sabellidae). J. Nat. Hist. 24: 195-218. *Fitzhugh, K. (1991). Further revisions of the Sabellidae subfamilies and cladistic relationships among the Fabriciinae (Annelida: Polychaeta). Zoological Journal of the Linnean Society, 102(4), 305–332. doi:10.1111/j.1096-3642.1991.tb00004.x *Fitzhugh, K. (1991). Systematics of several fabriciin fan worms (Polychaeta: Sabellidae: Fabriciinae) previously referred to ''Fabricia'' and ''Fabriciola''. J. Nat. Hist. 25: 1101-1120. *Fitzhugh, K. (1991). Uncini and the anchor-function hypothesis: Empirical tests and causal explanations. Bull. of Mar. Sci. 48(2): 574-583. *Fitzhugh, K. (1992). "On the systematic position of ''Monroika africana'' (Monro) (Polychaeta: Sabellidae: Fabriciinae) and a description of a new fabriciin genus and species from Australia." Proc. Biol. Soc. Wash. 105: 1116-131. *Fitzhugh, K. (1992). "Species of ''Fabriciola'' Friedrich, 1939 (Polychaeta: Sabellidae: Fabriciinae), from the California coast." Pacific Sci. 46: 68-76 *Fitzhugh, K. (1993). "''Novafabricia brunnea'' (Hartman, 1969), new combination, with an update on relationships among Fabriciinae taxa (Polychaeta: Sabellidae)." Contr. Sci. Nat. Hist. Mus. Los Angeles County 438: 1-12. *Fitzhugh, K. Giangrande, A., & Simboura, N. (1994). New species of ''Pseudofabriciola'' Fitzhugh, 1990 (Polychaeta: Sabellidae: Fabriciinae), from the Mediterranean Sea. Zoological Journal of the Linnean Society, 110(3), 219–241. doi:10.1111/j.1096-3642.1994.tb02016.x *Fitzhugh, K. (1998). "New fan worm genera and species (Polychaeta, Sabellidae, Fabriciinae) from the western Pacific, and cladistic relationships among genera." Zoologica Scripta, 27(3), 209–245. doi:10.1111/j.1463-6409.1998.tb00438.x *Fitzhugh, K. (1999). "New fanworm species (Polychaeta: Sabellidae: Fabriciinae) from Phuket, Thailand, with comments on ''Fabriciola flammula'' Rouse and ''Fabriciola cri'' Rouse." Contr. Sci. Nat. Hist. Mus. Los Angeles County 477: 1-17. *Fitzhugh, K. & Rouse, G. W. (1999). A remarkable new genus and species of fan worm (Polychaeta: Sabellidae: Sabellinae) associated with marine

gastropod Gastropods (), commonly known as slugs and snails, belong to a large Taxonomy (biology), taxonomic class of invertebrates within the phylum Mollusca called Gastropoda (). This class comprises snails and slugs from saltwater, freshwater, and fro ...

s. Invertebrate Biology 118(4): 357-390 *Fitzhugh, K. (2002) "New species of ''Fabricinuda'' Fitzhugh and ''Pseudofabriciola'' Fitzhugh (Polychaeta: Sabellidae: Fabriciinae), with an emendation of ''Pseudofabriciola australiensis'' (Hartmann-Schröder)." J. Nat. Hist. 36: 893-925. *Fitzhugh, K. (2002) Fan worm polychaetes (Sabellidae: Sabellinae) collected during the Thai-Danish Bioshelf Project. Phuket Marine Biological Center Special Publication 24: 353-424. *Fitzhugh, K. (2003). "A New Species of ''Megalomma'' Johansson, 1927 (Polychaeta: Sabellidae: Sabellinae) from Taiwan, with Comments on Sabellid Dorsal Lip Classification." Zoological Studies 42(1): 106-134 *Fitzhugh, K. (2005). The inferential basis of species hypotheses: the solution to defining the term “species.” Marine Ecology, 26(3-4), 155–165. doi:10.1111/j.1439-0485.2005.00058.x *Fitzhugh, K. (2006). "The abduction of phylogenetic hypotheses." Zootaxa 1145: 1–110. *Fitzhugh, K. (2006). "The 'requirement of total evidence' and its role in phylogenetic systematics." Biology and Philosophy 21(3), 309–351. doi:10.1007/s10539-005-7325-2 *Fitzhugh, K. (2006). "The philosophical basis of character coding for the inference of phylogenetic hypotheses." Zoologica Scripta, 35(3), 261–286. doi:10.1111/j.1463-6409.2006.00229.x *Fitzhugh, K. (2006). DNA Barcoding: An Instance of Technology-driven Science? BioScience, 56(6), 462–463. *Fitzhugh, K. (2007). "Fact, theory, test and evolution". Zoologica Scripta 37 (1): 109–113. DOI:10.1111/j.1463-6409.2007.00308.x *Fitzhugh, K. (2008). Clarifying the role of character loss in phylogenetic inference. Zoologica Scripta, 37(5), 561–569. doi:10.1111/j.1463-6409.2008.00338.x *Fitzhugh, K. (2008). Abductive Inference: Implications for “Linnean” and “Phylogenetic” Approaches for Representing Biological Systematization. Evolutionary Biology, 35(1), 52–82. doi:10.1007/s11692-008-9015-x *Fitzhugh, K. (2009). "Species as explanatory hypotheses: Refinements and implications." Acta Biotheoretica, 57(1), 201–248. doi:10.1007/s10441-009-9071-3 *Fitzhugh, K. (2009). "Between macro and molecular." BioScience, 59(1), 85–86. *Fitzhugh, K. (2010). "Evidence for evolution versus evidence for intelligent design: Parallel confusions". Evol Biol 37: 68–92. DOI:10.1007/s11692-010-9088-1 *Fitzhugh, K. (2010). "Revised systematics of ''Fabricia oregonica'' Banse, 1956 (Polychaeta: Sabellidae: Fabriciinae): an example of the need for a uninomial nomenclatural system." Zootaxa 2647: 35–50 *Fitzhugh, K. (2011). Beyond Cladistics: The Branching of a Paradigm. BioScience, 61(8), 638–639. doi:10.1525/bio.2011.61.8.11 *Fitzhugh, K. (2011). Phylogenetic Systematics by Any Other Name? BioScience, 61(8), 638–639.

Secondary co-authorship

*Farris, J. S., Källersjö, M., Albert, V. A., Allard, M., Anderberg, A., Bowditch, B., Bult, C., et al. (1995). Explanation. Cladistics, 11(2), 211–218. doi:10.1111/j.1096-0031.1995.tb00086.x *Geiger, D. L., Fitzhugh, K., & Thacker, C. E. (2001). Timeless characters: a response to Vermeij (1999). Paleobiology, 27(1), 177 –178. doi:10.1666/0094-8373(2001)027<0177:TCARTV>2.0.CO;2 *Huang, D., Fitzhugh, K., & Rouse, G. W. (2011). Inference of phylogenetic relationships within Fabriciidae (Sabellida, Annelida) using molecular and morphological data. Cladistics, 27(4), 356–379. doi:10.1111/j.1096-0031.2010.00343.x *Rouse, G., & Fitzhugh, K. (1994). Broadcasting fables: Is external fertilization really primitive? Sex, size, and larvae in sabellid polychaetes. Zoologica Scripta, 23(4), 271–312. doi:10.1111/j.1463-6409.1994.tb00390.x *Siddall, M. E., Fitzhugh, K., & Coates, K. A. (1998). Problems Determining the Phylogenetic Position of Echiurans and Pogonophorans with Limited Data. Cladistics, 14(4), 401–410. doi:10.1111/j.1096-0031.1998.tb00347.x

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Fitzhugh, Kirk J. 1957 births Living people American curators