Tusher African Hall
California Academy of Sciences

$25 General admission
$20 Cal Academy and Leakey Foundation members
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In the remote Turkana Basin in northern Kenya, bone fragments and fossil footprints preserve stories stretching back millions of years. Dr. Kay Behrensmeyer brings these stories to life, showing how scientists piece together ancient ecological settings and animal behavior from what remains after death.

Her work reveals how climate, landscape, and living communities affect both species adaptations and the fate of their remains. Through these deep-time insights, we’ll explore how the forces that shaped the past influence our world today and into the future.

About Kay Behrensmeyer

Anna K. (“Kay”) Behrensmeyer is a Leakey Foundation grantee and recipient of the 2024 Gordon P. Getty Award. She has worked in the Department of Paleobiology at the Smithsonian National Museum of Natural History since 1981; she has been a Senior Scientist there since 2009. She was elected a Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences in 2011, a Member of the National Academy of Sciences in 2020, and a Member of the American Philosophical Society in 2021.

Behrensmeyer is a ‘big-picture’ scientist with an over-arching interest in the evolution of terrestrial ecosystems—which in lay terms means understanding how animals interacted with their environment, and with each other, in deep time.

Behrensmeyer has undertaken fieldwork at various paleontological sites in the East African Rift Valley System, but her longest and best-known involvement is with research on the east side of Lake Turkana where she discovered what, at the time, was the earliest evidence for the manufacture of stone tools by early hominins.

Sponsors

This lecture is presented in partnership with the California Academy of Sciences.

This lecture is made possible by the generous support of the Ann and Gordon Getty Foundation, Camilla and George Smith, and the Joan and Arnold Travis Education Fund.

Academy members and donors, please log in after adding tickets to your cart to receive your discount.