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Beth Shapiro
August 19, 2008
Beth Shapiro is an assistant
professor of biology at Pennsylvania State University and is
a widely acclaimed researcher in the brand-new field of ancient
DNA. She was recently a featured scientist in a special Smithsonian
magazine section, "37 Under 36: America's Young Innovators
in the Arts and Sciences" for her work analyzing the DNA
of the long-extinct dodo bird.
Ancient DNA research analyzes
the genes of extinct plants and animals, letting scientists trace
the evolution and extinction of species with a precision unimaginable
just five years ago. By comparing dodo DNA with the genes of
five other species, for example, Dr. Shapiro's research established
that the flightless bird was a distant relative of the pigeon.
Her 2004 paper in Science argued that the bison decline began
much earlier than suspected - about 37,000 years ago - and was
thus not caused primarily by human hunters in North America.
As a Rhodes Scholar in 1999,
Dr. Shapiro apprenticed with Oxford University's Alan Cooper,
a pioneer in ancient DNA research, and in the six years since,
she has risen to the top of the field. She would eventually replace
Dr. Cooper as the head of Oxford's Henry Wellcome Ancient Biomolecules
Centre where she stayed until her appointment at Penn State this
fall. |
