Our Upcoming Speaker
Note: Since October 2022, we have returned to in-person meetings at the Birmingham Zoo using a hybrid Zoom-In Person format with the in-person meeting at the Lodge at the Birmingham Zoo

​Title: "What happened to crustaceans when non-flying dinosaurs became extinct?"

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Speaker:  Adiel Klompmaker, PhD, Curator of Paleontology, Department of Museum Research and Collections, University of Alabama Museums

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Abstract:

​The famous Cretaceous-Paleogene mass extinction 66 million years ago wiped out a stunning ~75% of life on Earth. Causes are a meteorite with a diameter of ~10 km striking near Mexico and massive volcanic eruptions in India. Victims include charismatic critters such as non-flying dinosaurs, mosasaurs, pterosaurs, most ammonites, and rudist bivalves. Crustaceans such as crabs, lobsters, and shrimps did survive and even thrive today, but what happened to them around this Cretaceous-Paleogene boundary? Dr. Adiel Klompmaker will present preliminary results based on field work and museum research in Denmark as well as some insights from the Paleocene of Alabama.

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About the Speaker: 

Dr. Adiel Klompmaker is a Curator of Paleontology in the Department of Museum Research and Collections within the University of Alabama Museums. His passion for paleontology led to a master’s degree (Utrecht University), a PhD (Kent State University), and couple of postdoctoral positions (University of Florida and UC Berkeley) before coming to Alabama. Although he enjoys fossil plants and vertebrates as well, he is primarily an invertebrate paleontologist. His research focuses mainly on biotic interactions (predation and parasitism) among marine animals and many aspects of the crustacean fossil record. Thus far, he has published ~90 scientific articles and supervised research of >15 students. Currently, he serves as an associate editor for the journal Paleobiology. He is in charge of the UA Museums’ paleontology collection, working with a collections manager and students on various curation projects. He also enjoys teaching in UA's Blount Scholars Program. Furthermore, he is involved in a variety of outreach activities for the general public and avocational paleontologists, and manages Harrell Station Paleontological Site.

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