Rate My Professor Philip C. J. Donoghue

Philip C. J. Donoghue is Professor of Palaeobiology in the School of Earth Sciences at the University of Bristol. He holds a B.Sc. from the University of Leicester, an M.Sc. from the University of Sheffield, and a Ph.D. from the University of Leicester. His research focuses on major transitions in evolutionary history, including the origin and early evolution of vertebrates, animals, and plants, through the integration of evidence from living and fossil organisms, developmental biology, phylogenetics, and molecular biology in the emerging field of molecular palaeobiology. He pioneered the application of synchrotron tomography in palaeontology and has contributed significantly to establishing the role of palaeontology in calibrating evolutionary timescales.

Donoghue joined the University of Bristol in 2003 as a lecturer in geology, progressing to senior lecturer, reader, and professor of palaeobiology in 2010. Prior to this, he held positions including an 1851 Research Fellowship at the University of Birmingham and a NERC Independent Research Fellowship at the University of Leicester. He was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society in 2015. His contributions have been recognized with awards including the Philip Leverhulme Prize in 2004, the Bigsby Medal of the Geological Society in 2007, and the President’s Medal of the Palaeontological Association in 2014. He has served on the councils of the Palaeontological Association, the Systematics Association, the Micropalaeontological Society, and the European Society for Evolutionary Developmental Biology.