Andrew Smith is a palaeobiologist interested in the
systematics and evolutionary history of echinoderms. He is Scottish by birth
and studied geology at Edinburgh University then biology at Exeter University.
After a post-doctoral stint in the Geology Department of Liverpool University
working on primitive fossil echinoderms he took up a position at the Natural
History Museum where he worked for 30 years as the resident echinoderm
specialist before retiring in 2012. He is an expert on the fossil record of sea
urchins and their extinct relatives, and studies large-scale evolutionary
processes, especially diversification and extinction in the sea. His work
ranges from using molecular systematics to investigate relationships among the
major groups of living echinoderms, to investigating their earliest fossil
record. He is the creator and editor of a comprehensive website directory for
all the higher taxa of sea urchins, the Echinoid Directory. He has received many awards for his research
from both the geological and zoological communities and is an elected fellow of
both the Royal Society and Royal Society of Edinburgh.
