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Assistant Professor of Zoology
Research Associate, SNOMNH
Phone: (405) 325-6307
Fax: (405)325-6202RM/Lab:SH 202
Current Research Interests and Subject Areas Available for Graduate Research
My main research interests focus on functional morphology and ecology of Cretaceous mammals. In particular, I am studying how we can best predict body size and determine diet in early mammals. The Early Cretaceous was an important time in mammalian evolution. The introduction of flowering plants and concomitant radiation of insects provided vast new resources for early mammals. Traditionally, Cretaceous mammals had been considered mainly insectivorous. But newer research is showing that the story is not so simple. Cretaceous mammals, though relatively small (certainly compared to the dinosaurs!), still occupied a rather diverse range of body sizes and ecological niches. I have spent the past few years analyzing better ways to estimate body size in early placental and marsupial mammals. Other related interests include 2-D and 3-D analyses of mammalian tooth shape and how this relates to diet. I have studied this relationship in Late Cretaceous mammals and continue to work back through older faunas.
Other research projects include the systematic analysis of multituberculate mammals from North America. Multituberculates were one of the most successful groups of mammals. They first appear in the Late Jurassic and survive until the late Eocene, a span of at least 100 million years. Multituberculates are well-known from the Late Jurassic and Late Cretaceous, but little is known about them in the Early Cretaceous. I am currently studying multituberculates from the Early Cretaceous deposits of Montana, Oklahoma and Texas. I am also involved in a joint project with colleagues from the Sam Noble Oklahoma Museum of Natural History studying mammals from Early Cretaceous faunas of the Lakota Formation in South Dakota and the Cloverly Formation in Montana and Oklahoma.
M.S., Murray State University
B.S., Ohio State University
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