Andrew Smith (palaeontologist)


Andrew Benjamin Smith is a British palaeontologist, known for his research on the palaeontology of echinoderms. His cladistic classification of the phylum Echinodermata has become standard.

Education and career

Growing up in Stonehaven on the eastern coast of Scotland, Andrew B. Smith at age 13 was inspired to collect fossils after watching an episode on fossil collection aired on the television programme Blue Peter. On holiday in 1967 he first collected fossils from the Rhaetian age Penarth Group at Watchet, Somerset. In 1968 on holiday in Shetland, he collected a complete fossil of a Devonian fish — the specimen was put on display at the Shetland Museum in Lerwick. From 1973 to 1976 Smith studied geology at the University of Edinburgh, where he graduated with first class honours. For the summer of 1976 he received, on the recommendation of Euan Clarkson, a Carnegie Award to study echinoid fossil distribution in the Aalenian of the Cheltenham region of Gloucestershire. In autumn 1976 he matriculated as a graduate student in the biology department of the University of Exeter. There he received in 1980 a PhD under the supervision of David Nichols. Smith's PhD thesis involved a breakthrough in echinoid functional morphology through his use of the scanning electron microscope combined with histological preparations and some in vivo research. He published four major papers dealing with links between echinoid skeletal histology and echinoid soft-tissue anatomy. From 1980 to 1982 he worked at the University of Liverpool as a research assistant to Christopher R. C. Paul. At the Natural [History Museum, London|Natural History Museum], London, Smith was a scientific officer from 1982 to 2012, when he retired. During his 30 years of employment at the museum, he was the author or co-author of many papers on the phylogeny, systematics, and taxonomy of echinoderms and gained an international reputation as a leading expert on echinoderm palaeontology. In 1985 he participated in Western scientists' first geological traverse of the Tibetan plateau. Smith was the co-author, with Claud William Wright, of a twelve-part series of monographs on British echinoid fossils of the Cretaceous.
Smith's research is not strictly limited to echinoderms but also deals with methods of inferring patterns in evolutionary development from the fossil record. With Colin Patterson, he pointed out possible pitfalls in interpreting the fossil record. Smith and colleagues assessed mass extinctions such as that at the Cretaceous/Tertiary transition from studies on spiny-shelled fossils. He did research on the earliest evolutionary origins of echinoderms and establishing the dates of the evolutionary origins of metazoan body morphologies. He also carried out comparative studies on evolution and species diversification using molecular biological methods and dealt with ancient DNA of fossil insects preserved in amber.

Echinoid Directory

Andrew B. Smith designed and created a web-based, echinoid-specific approach to systematic zoology and paleontology called "The Echinoid Directory" sponsored by the Natural History Museum, London. The website was driven by the international community of echinoid scientists, who contributed via a web interface. There were over 2,000 species pages and over 10,000 specimen illustrations. As of February 2025, the website is no longer functional, and has been taken offline.

Awards and honours

The Linnean Society of London awarded Andrew B. Smith in 1993 the Linnean Society Bicentenary Medal and in 2005 the Zoology Medal. The Geological Society of London award him in 1995 the Bigsby Medal and in 2002 the Lyell Medal. Smith was elected in 1996 a Fellow of the Royal Society of Edinburgh and in 2002 a Fellow of the Royal Society. He received in 2004 the Palaeontological Association's Golden Trilobite Award and in 2020 the association's Lapworth Medal. In 2005 he was elected a corresponding member of the Paläontologische Gesellschaft.

Selected publications

Journal articles

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Book chapters

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Books and monographs

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  • 2002