School of Earth Sciences

People > Staff > Prof Phil Donoghue

Position | Departmental responsibilities | Research Interests | Publications | Further information

Position

Professor of Palaeobiology

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Departmental responsibilities

Teaching quality officer. Teaching: Year I – Earth History - Geological Maps - Arran Field Skills class; Year II – Palaeontology; Year III – Micropalaeontology

Admin: Director of Graduate School

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Research Interests

My research is focused on the relationship between evolution and embryology, integrating living and fossil organisms, developmental biology, and knowledge of their evolutionary relationships, to provide an holistic understanding of major episodes in evolutionary history.

I have particular interest in the evolutionary emergence of vertebrates, and of ecdysozoans, but also in the evolutionary emergence of animals more generally. This entails classical palaeobiology, but also molecular genetics – to calibrate the Tree of Life to time using molecular clock theory, and to determine the role of genetic regulators of development in effecting organismal-level evolutionary change.

My group has facilities for rock digestion, high-end computed tomography, animal culture facilities and a molecular laboratory for RT-PCR, cloning, and in situ hybridisation.

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Publications

Link to Prof Philip Donoghue on the University's on-line database of research outputs

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Further information

Prof Philip Donoghue is a member of the Palaeobiology and Biodiversity Research Group at Bristol, and has his own pages at http://palaeo.gly.bris.ac.uk/donoghue/