Philippe Taquet
Philippe Robert Taquet (born April 25, 1940 in Saint-Quentin ) is a French vertebrate paleontologist who works with dinosaurs . He was a professor at the Muséum national d'histoire naturelle (MNHN) in Paris.
Taquet studied at the Sorbonne with the first part of the French doctorate (Thèse 3eme Cycle) in 1965 and the second part (Docteur ès Sciences) in 1973. From 1965 to 1981 he worked as a scientist for the CNRS . 1981 to 2000 he was director of the laboratory for paleontology of the MNHN and 1985 to 1990 director of the MNHN. He also headed the CNRS Research Group (URA) on paleoanatomy, phylogeny and paleogeography .
In 1990 he became a corresponding and in 2004 full member of the Académie des sciences , of which he was vice-president from 2011 to 2012 and president from 2013 to 2014.
Since 2004 he has been President of the Commission internationale pour l'histoire de la géologie (INHIGEO). Since 2001 he has been an honorary member of the Society of Vertebrate Paleontology . He is an officer of the Legion of Honor and the Ordre national du Mérite .
He was on field excursions, particularly in North Africa (Morocco, Niger), where he found a number of new dinosaur species such as Ouranosaurus (1976, an Iguanodon -like dinosaur) in Gadoufaoua from the Aptium of Niger . He also found the giant crocodile Sarcosuchus made from the chalk there. He has also been to excavations in Brazil, Argentina, Bolivia, Mongolia, Madagascar, Thailand and Laos. In total, he named over nine new dinosaur species: in addition to the aforementioned Ouranosaurus, Atlasaurus , Berberosaurus , Piveteausaurus , Chebsaurus , Genusaurus , Lurdusaurus , Pyroraptor , Tangvayosaurus , Tazoudasaurus and the species Valdosaurus nigeriensis (with Peter Galton ).
In 1999 the Nigersaurus taqueti was named in his honor. In 2009 he received the Sue Tyler Friedman Medal .
Fonts
- Dinosaur Impressions: Postcards from a Paleontologist , Cambridge University Press 1998
- L'Empreinte des Dinosaures , Ed. Odile Jacob 2004
- Georges Cuvier (Naissance d'un génie) , Ed. Odile Jacob 2006
Web links
- Literature by and about Philippe Taquet in the SUDOC catalog (Association of French University Libraries)
- Philippe Taquet on the Académie des Sciences website
| personal data | |
|---|---|
| SURNAME | Taquet, Philippe |
| ALTERNATIVE NAMES | Taquet, Philippe Robert (full name) |
| BRIEF DESCRIPTION | French zoologist and paleontologist |
| DATE OF BIRTH | April 25, 1940 |
| PLACE OF BIRTH | Saint-Quentin |