Dr Elizabeth M Steell

Degrees, Awards and Prizes

MSci (University College London), PhD (Cambridge University)

Research Themes

I mostly research the evolution and fossil record of a group of birds called passerines. This group includes the songbirds, which are a hugely diverse and successful radiation of modern birds and include robins, blackbirds and crows. I study the skeletal morphology of passerines to try to understand the story of their 30-million-year evolutionary history. In my work I employ micro-CT scanning technology to visualise passerine bones and fossils as high-resolution 3D images. I then use phylogenetic inference and comparative methods to make inferences about the origins of different passerine subgroups. My research takes me to many places for museum collection visits and fieldwork, from Germany and Spain to New Zealand. When I’m not travelling or working on morphology, I develop phylogenetic comparative methods for discrete datasets in the R programming language.

Responsibilities

I teach vertebrate palaeontology and evolution across the Earth Science and Zoology departments. Prior to being a fellow at Girton, I was a teaching lecturer in palaeobiology for a year at University College London.

Other

During my PhD I was regularly active in the Cambridge University Ornithology Society, serving as Vice President and then President between 2021-2023. My favourite hobby is birdwatching, so during my presidency I started Weekly Wednesday Bird Walks which are still running every Wednesday morning at Paradise Nature Reserve in Cambridge. 

For my research, in 2021 I received an American Ornithology Society Student Research Award and a Society of Systematic Biologists Research Award. In 2023 I was awarded a Phyllis and Eileen Gibbs Travelling Research Fellowship to carry out palaeontological fieldwork in New Zealand.

Roles within the University

• Research Associate in the Department of Earth Sciences