Hi, I’m Alison! 👋😄
👩💻 🪸 I am a palaeoecologist at the University of Oxford, primarily interested in applying quantitative palaeoecology approaches to conservation palaeobiology questions.
🌍 I am currently a Schmidt AI in Science Postdoctoral Fellow. My research focuses on mass extinctions, the evolutionary and ecological pathways that allow animals to survive, and how we can use machine learning and AI to identify survival strategies and apply them to the current climate crisis.
News
25 September 2026 — 5th Annual IFCRS Early Career Symposium: I am pleased to be organizing again this year the International Fossil and Coral Reef Society Early Career Symposium on 19 November. We are excited to highlight 10 early career researchers from across the world…
25 September 2026 — I am moving to the University of Oxford!: I have now joined the University of Oxford’s Department of Earth Sciences. For the next two years, as a Schmidt AI in Science Fellow, I will be working at the intersection between quantitative palaeoecology and…
28 July 2026 — New paper on ecosystem engineering and biodiversity.: I am excited to share my newest publication, “Marine biodiversity was greater in the presence of ecosystem engineers throughout the Phanerozoic,” with Simon Darroch and William Gearty, which is officially published in Nature Communications today…
20 July 2026 — Life and Planet 2026 and ESSG updates: We have just finished another successful Life and Planet meeting. Many thanks as always to the Geological Society of London and Burlington House for hosting nearly 100 researchers from across the globe who came together…
Recent publications
Marine biodiversity was greater in the presence of ecosystem engineers throughout the Phanerozoic — Nature Communications, 2026 (paper)
The trace fossil record of the Nama Group, Namibia: exploring the terminal Ediacaran roots of the Cambrian explosion — Earth-Science Reviews, 2026 (paper)
‘Earth system engineers’ and the cumulative impact of organisms in deep time — Trends in Ecology & Evolution, 2025 (paper)
Tracking bioturbation through time: The evolution of the marine sedimentary mixed and transition layers — Science Advances, 2025 (paper)
How to engineer a habitable planet: the rise of marine ecosystem engineers through the Phanerozoic — Palaeontology, 2024 (paper)