Douglas Erwin

Research Paleobiologist and Curator Paleozoic Mollusks, Interim Director

National Museum of Natural History

Smithsonian Institution

Washington, D.C. 20560-0121

erwin.doug@nmnh.si.edu

Research Interests

Evolutionary radiations, particularly the Cambrian metazoan radiation and post-extinction biotic recoveries; the Permian mass extinction; and evolutionary history and systematics of Cambrian-Triassic gastropods; astrobiology; comparative evolutionary developmental biology; theoretical morphospaces.

Current or Projected Exhibits

SITES exhibit on "The fossils of the Burgess Shale and the Cambrian radiation"; new Oceans Hall

Recent Publications

Erwin, D. H. and E. H. Davidson. 2002 The last common bilaterian ancestor. Development 129: 3021-3032

Erwin, D. H., Bowring, S. A., and Jin, Y. G. 2002. The End-Permian Mass Extinctions. In: Catastrophic Events and Mass Extinctions: Impacts and Beyond. C. Koeberl and K. G. MacLeod, eds. Geological Society of America Special Paper 356: 363-383.

Nützel, A. & Erwin, D. H. 2001. New Late Triassic Gastropods from the Wallowa Terrane (Idaho) and their biogeographic significance. Facies 45: 87-92.

Tong Jinnan and D. H. Erwin. 2001. Triassic gastropods of South Qinling Mountains, Smithsonian Contributions to Paleobiology, No. 92, 47 p.

Erwin, D. H. 2000. Macroevolution is more than repeated rounds of microevolution. Evolution & Development 2:78-84.

Jin, Y. G., Y. Wang, W. Wang, Q. H. Shang, C. Q. Cao, and D. H. Erwin. 2000. Pattern of Marine mass extinction near the Permian-Triassic boundary in South China. Science 289:432-436.

Erwin, D. H. 1999. Biospheric perturbations: from the Neoproterozoic-Cambrian radiation to the end-Permian crisis. Journal of African Earth Sciences 28:5-27.

Erwin, D. H. 1999. The origin of bodyplans. American Zoologist 39:617-629.

Erwin, D. H. 1998.The end and the beginning: Recoveries from mass extinctions. Trends in Ecology and Evolution 13:344-349