An American who has lived in China for more than 10 years and traveled extensively all over the country, Thomas Stidham has a hobby—bird watching in parks. “Birds are dinosaurs,” this Ph.D. in integrative biology from the University of California, Berkeley, said. Though the statement may sound absurd at first, it is actually scientifically supported. And this is precisely Stidham’s academic niche: avian evolution and paleontology.
As a paleontologist working at the Institute of Vertebrate Paleontology and Paleoanthropology (IVPP) affiliated to the Chinese Academy of Sciences in Beijing, Stidham mainly focuses on the evolution of birds by examining their fossils from China and around the world.
“I have also done research on insects,.
