Louis Leo Jacobs (born August 27, 1948) is an American

vertebrate Vertebrates () are animals with a vertebral column (backbone or spine), and a cranium, or skull. The vertebral column surrounds and protects the spinal cord, while the cranium protects the brain. The vertebrates make up the subphylum Vertebra ...

paleontologist 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 ...

who discovered ''

Malawisaurus ''Malawisaurus'' (meaning "Malawi lizard") is an extinct genus of titanosaurian sauropod dinosaur. It is known from the Dinosaur Beds of northern Malawi, which probably date to the Aptian stage of the Early Cretaceous. The type species is ''M. di ...

'' while on an expedition in

Malawi Malawi, officially the Republic of Malawi, is a landlocked country in Southeastern Africa. It is bordered by Zambia to the west, Tanzania to the north and northeast, and Mozambique to the east, south, and southwest. Malawi spans over and ...

. Much of his research concerns the interrelationships of biotic and

abiotic In biology and ecology, abiotic components or abiotic factors are non-living chemical and physical parts of the environment that affect living organisms and the functioning of ecosystems. Abiotic factors and the phenomena associated with them und ...

events through time. In 2010, he has focused on the middle portion of the

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 ...

and the

Cenozoic The Cenozoic Era ( ; ) is Earth's current geological era, representing the last 66million years of Earth's history. It is characterized by the dominance of mammals, insects, birds and angiosperms (flowering plants). It is the latest of three g ...

, especially with respect to

terrestrial Terrestrial refers to things related to land or the planet Earth, as opposed to extraterrestrial. Terrestrial may also refer to: * Terrestrial animal, an animal that lives on land opposed to living in water, or sometimes an animal that lives on o ...

ecosystems. In 2018, he retired from the Dedman College as Professor Emeritus of Earth Sciences. He used to be the president of the Society of Vertebrate Paleontology and is currently a professor of geological sciences at Dedman College and the President of the Institute for the Study of Earth and Man (ISEM) at

Southern Methodist University Southern Methodist University (SMU) is a Private university, private research university in Dallas, Texas, United States, with a satellite campus in Taos County, New Mexico. SMU was founded on April 17, 1911, by the Methodist Episcopal Church, ...

(SMU). At one point in time, he was the director of the

Museum of Natural History A natural history museum or museum of natural history is a scientific institution with natural history collections that include current and historical records of animals, plants, fungi, ecosystems, geology, paleontology, climatology, and more ...

Dallas, Texas Dallas () is a city in the U.S. state of Texas and the most populous city in the Dallas–Fort Worth metroplex, the List of Texas metropolitan areas, most populous metropolitan area in Texas and the Metropolitan statistical area, fourth-most ...

. Louis Jacobs is a vertebrate paleontologist who utilizes the fossil record to answer significant questions about Earth and life history. His fieldwork is currently focused in

Angola Angola, officially the Republic of Angola, is a country on the west-Central Africa, central coast of Southern Africa. It is the second-largest Portuguese-speaking world, Portuguese-speaking (Lusophone) country in both total area and List of c ...

Antarctica Antarctica () is Earth's southernmost and least-populated continent. Situated almost entirely south of the Antarctic Circle and surrounded by the Southern Ocean (also known as the Antarctic Ocean), it contains the geographic South Pole. ...

Alaska Alaska ( ) is a non-contiguous U.S. state on the northwest extremity of North America. Part of the Western United States region, it is one of the two non-contiguous U.S. states, alongside Hawaii. Alaska is also considered to be the north ...

, and

Mongolia Mongolia is a landlocked country in East Asia, bordered by Russia to the north and China to the south and southeast. It covers an area of , with a population of 3.5 million, making it the world's List of countries and dependencies by po ...

. The

oviraptorosauria Oviraptorosaurs ("egg thief lizards") are a group of feathered maniraptoran dinosaurs from the Cretaceous Period (geology), Period of what are now Asia and North America. They are distinct for their characteristically short, beaked, parrot-like s ...

theropod Theropoda (; from ancient Greek , (''therion'') "wild beast"; , (''pous, podos'') "foot"">wiktionary:ποδός"> (''pous, podos'') "foot" is one of the three major groups (clades) of dinosaurs, alongside Ornithischia and Sauropodom ...

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 ...

'' Corythoraptor jacobsi'' was named after him by students he mentored at SMU. He is married to paleobotanist Bonnie Jacobs.

Career

He earned his

Ph.D. A Doctor of Philosophy (PhD, DPhil; or ) is a terminal degree that usually denotes the highest level of academic achievement in a given discipline and is awarded following a course of graduate study and original research. The name of the deg ...

from the

University of Arizona The University of Arizona (Arizona, U of A, UArizona, or UA) is a Public university, public Land-grant university, land-grant research university in Tucson, Arizona, United States. Founded in 1885 by the 13th Arizona Territorial Legislature, it ...

. While he was accomplishing this, Jacobs was also working with

Kenya Kenya, officially the Republic of Kenya, is a country located in East Africa. With an estimated population of more than 52.4 million as of mid-2024, Kenya is the 27th-most-populous country in the world and the 7th most populous in Africa. ...

anthropologist An anthropologist is a scientist engaged in the practice of anthropology. Anthropologists study aspects of humans within past and present societies. Social anthropology, cultural anthropology and philosophical anthropology study the norms, values ...

Richard Leakey Richard Erskine Frere Leakey (19 December 1944 – 2 January 2022) was a Kenyan paleoanthropologist, conservationist and politician. Leakey held a number of official positions in Kenya, mostly in institutions of archaeology and wildlife cons ...

. Afterward, he began working at SMU in 1983.

Books written

* ''A Global View of Early Cretaceous Dinosaurs'' (1997) * ''Cretaceous Dinosaurs of Africa: Examples from Cameroon and Malawi, Memoirs of the Queensland Museum'' (Co-writer) (1996) * '' Lone Star Dinosaurs'' (1995) * ''Cretaceous Airport - The Surprising Story of Real Dinosaurs at DFW'' (1993) * ''Quest for the African Dinosaur: Ancient Roots of the Modern World'' (1993) * ''Evolution of Tertiary Mammals of North America: Terrestrial carnivores, ungulates, and ungulatelike mammals'' (Co-editor)"Evolution of Tertiary Mammals of North America"
by Louis L. Jacobs on

Google Books Google Books (previously known as Google Book Search, Google Print, and by its code-name Project Ocean) is a service from Google that searches the full text of books and magazines that Google has scanned, converted to text using optical charac ...

* ''Late Miocene Small Mammal Faunal Dynamics: The Crossroads of the Arabian Peninsula'' (Co-writer) * ''A Dinosaur from the Republic of Yemen'' (Co-writer) * ''Aspects of Vertebrate History: Essays in Honor of Edwin Harris Colbert'' (1980)

References

External links

Findings on Haasiophis terrasanctus (Fossil Snake)

The Occurrence of Cretaceous Dinosaurs

Pachyrhachis Problematicus
{{DEFAULTSORT:Jacobs, Louis L. 1948 births Living people American paleontologists Presidents of the Society of Vertebrate Paleontology

Career

Books written

See also

References

External links