ReBecca Hunt-Foster is an American

paleontologist Paleontology (), also spelled palaeontology or palæontology, is the scientific study of life that existed prior to, and sometimes including, the start of the Holocene epoch (roughly 11,700 years before present). It includes the study of fossi ...

. She has worked with

dinosaur Dinosaurs are a diverse group of reptiles of the clade Dinosauria. They first appeared during the Triassic period, between 243 and 233.23 million years ago (mya), although the exact origin and timing of the evolution of dinosaurs is t ...

remains from the Late Jurassic to Late Cretaceous of the Colorado Plateau, Rocky Mountains, Southcentral, and the Southwestern

United States The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 states, a federal district, five major unincorporated territorie ...

of America. She described the

'' Arkansaurus fridayi'' and identified the first juvenile ''

Torosaurus ''Torosaurus'' ("perforated lizard", in reference to the large openings in its frill) is a genus of herbivorous ceratopsid dinosaur that lived during the late Maastrichtian stage of the Cretaceous period, between 68 and 66 million years ago, tho ...

'' occurrences from

Big Bend National Park Big Bend National Park is an American national park located in West Texas, bordering Mexico. The park has national significance as the largest protected area of Chihuahuan Desert topography and ecology in the United States, and was named after ...

in North America in 2008.

Career

* Mulberry High School, Mulberry, Arkansas. 1998 * B.S. Earth Sciences,

University of Arkansas The University of Arkansas (U of A, UArk, or UA) is a public land-grant research university in Fayetteville, Arkansas. It is the flagship campus of the University of Arkansas System and the largest university in the state. Founded as Arkansas ...

, Fayetteville, Arkansas. 2003 * M.S. Geology,

Texas Tech University Texas Tech University (Texas Tech, Tech, or TTU) is a public research university in Lubbock, Texas. Established on , and called Texas Technological College until 1969, it is the main institution of the five-institution Texas Tech University Sys ...

, Lubbock, Texas. 2005 Hunt-Foster is the park paleontologist for the

National Park Service The National Park Service (NPS) is an agency of the United States federal government within the U.S. Department of the Interior that manages all national parks, most national monuments, and other natural, historical, and recreational propertie ...

Dinosaur National Monument Dinosaur National Monument is an American national monument located on the southeast flank of the Uinta Mountains on the border between Colorado and Utah at the confluence of the Green and Yampa rivers. Although most of the monument area is in ...

, where she has worked since August 2018. Previously she was the district paleontologist for the

Bureau of Land Management The Bureau of Land Management (BLM) is an agency within the United States Department of the Interior responsible for administering federal lands. Headquartered in Washington DC, and with oversight over , it governs one eighth of the country's la ...

–Utah, where she has worked from 2013 to 2018. She was employed for five years as paleontology collections manager at the Museums of Western Colorado from 2007 to 2012 and a research assistant at

Augustana College Augustana College may refer to: *Augustana College (Illinois) *Augustana University Sioux Falls, South Dakota *Augustana University College, Alberta See also *Augustana Divinity School (Neuendettelsau) The Augustana-Hochschule Neuendettelsau is ...

from 2005 to 2008.

Professional work

Hunt-Foster's current research includes

Early Cretaceous The Early Cretaceous ( geochronological name) or the Lower Cretaceous (chronostratigraphic name), is the earlier or lower of the two major divisions of the Cretaceous. It is usually considered to stretch from 145 Ma to 100.5 Ma. Geology Pro ...

ornithomimosaurs Ornithomimosauria ("bird-mimic lizards") are theropod dinosaurs which bore a superficial resemblance to the modern-day ostrich. They were fast, omnivorous or herbivorous dinosaurs from the Cretaceous Period of Laurasia (now Asia, Europe and North ...

from North America, the Upper Cretaceous

Williams Fork Formation The Williams Fork Formation is a Campanian ( Edmontonian) geologic formation of the Mesaverde Group in Colorado. Dinosaur remains are among the fossils that have been recovered from the formation, most notably ''Pentaceratops sternbergii'',. Other ...

paleofauna of western

Colorado Colorado (, other variants) is a state in the Mountain West subregion of the Western United States. It encompasses most of the Southern Rocky Mountains, as well as the northeastern portion of the Colorado Plateau and the western edge of t ...

, the ichnofauna of the lower Jurassic to lower Cretaceous rocks of southeastern Utah''.'' ReBecca has worked as a paleontologist in western Colorado and eastern Utah since 2007. Prior to moving to the area, ReBecca was a research assistant at

where she worked on latest Cretaceous ceratopsian dinosaurs from southern

Laramidia Laramidia was an island continent that existed during the Late Cretaceous period (99.6–66 Ma), when the Western Interior Seaway split the continent of North America in two. In the Mesozoic era, Laramidia was an island land mass separated from A ...

and preparing ''

Cryolophosaurus ''Cryolophosaurus'' ( or ; "CRY-oh-loaf-oh-SAWR-us") is a genus of large theropod dinosaur known from only a single species ''Cryolophosaurus ellioti'', from the early Jurassic of Antarctica. It was one of the largest theropods of the Early Jura ...

'', the first known dinosaur from

Antarctica Antarctica () is Earth's southernmost and least-populated continent. Situated almost entirely south of the Antarctic Circle and surrounded by the Southern Ocean, it contains the geographic South Pole. Antarctica is the fifth-largest contine ...

. She has also worked on Precambrian stromatolites and the geology of Glacier National Park.

Popular books

Hunt-Foster is the coauthor of "Behavioral interpretations from chasmosaurine ceratopsid bonebeds: a review." with Andrew Farke, in the 2010 book New Perspectives on Horned Dinosaurs.

References

Bibliography

*Hunt-Foster, ReBecca K. 2016. The Macomb Expedition. Sojourns: Landscapes for the People 11(2): 58-59. *Hunt-Foster, ReBecca K., Martin G. Lockley, Andrew R.C. Milner, John R. Foster, Neffra A. Matthews. Brent H. Breithaupt, and Joshua A. Smith. 2016. Tracking dinosaurs in BLM Canyon Country, Utah: Geology of the Intermountain West 3: 67–100 *Kirkland, James I., Marina Suarez, Celina Suarez, and ReBecca K. Hunt-Foster, 2016. The Lower Cretaceous in east-central Utah—the Cedar Mountain Formation and its bounding strata: Geology of the Intermountain West 3: 101–228 *Foster, John R. and ReBecca K. Hunt-Foster. 2015. First report of a giant neosuchian (Crocodyliformes) in the Williams Fork Formation (Upper Cretaceous: Campanian) of Colorado. Cretaceous Research 55: 66-73. *Kirkland, Jim, John Foster, ReBecca K. Hunt-Foster, Gregory A. Liggett, and Kelli Trujillo. 2014. Mid-Mesozoic: The Age of Dinosaurs in Transition. Conference Proceedings, 88p. *Trujillo, Kelli C., John R. Foster, ReBecca K. Hunt-Foster, and Kevin R. Chamberlain. 2014. A U/Pb age for the Mygatt-Moore Quarry, Upper Jurassic Morrison Formation, Mesa County, Colorado. Volumina Jurassica XII(2): 107-114. *Lockley, Martin G., ReBecca K. Hunt-Foster, John R. Foster, Ken Cart, and Scott Gerwe. 2014. Early Jurassic track assemblages from the Granite Creek Area of Eastern Utah. In Lockley, M.G. and Lucas, S.G., eds., Fossil footprints of western North America. New Mexico Museum of Natural History and Science Bulletin 62: 205-210 *Lockley, Martin G., Gerard D. Gierlinski, Karen Houck, Jong-Deock Lim, Kyung Soo Kim, Dal-Yong Kim, Tae Hyeong Kim, Seung-Hyeop Kang, ReBecca K. Hunt-Foster, Rihui Li, Christopher Chesser, Rob Gay, Zofia Dubicka, Ken Cart, and Christy Wright. 2014. New excavations at the Mill Canyon Dinosaur Track Site (Cedar Mountain Formation, Lower Cretaceous) of Eastern Utah. In Lockley, M.G. and Lucas, S.G., eds., Fossil footprints of western North America. New Mexico Museum of Natural History and Science Bulletin 62: 287-300 *Foster, John R. and ReBecca K. Hunt-Foster. 2011. New occurrences of dinosaur skin of two types (Sauropoda? and Dinosauria indet.) from the Late Jurassic of North America (Mygatt-Moore Quarry, Morrison Formation). Journal of Vertebrate Paleontology 31(3): 717-721. *Hunt, ReBecca K. and Andrew A. Farke. 2010. Behavioral interpretations from chasmosaurine ceratopsid bonebeds: a review. Pages 447-455 in M. J. Ryan, B. J. Chinnery-Allgeier, and D. A. Eberth (eds.), New Perspectives on Horned Dinosaurs. Indiana University Press, Bloomington. *Hunt-Foster, ReBecca K. 2010. Packing methods for domestic and international fossil shipping. Pages 97–102 in M.A. Brown, J.F. Kane, and W.G. Parker, (ed.s), Methods in Fossil Preparation: Proceedings of the First Annual Fossil Preparation and Collections Symposium. *Hunt, ReBecca K. and Thomas M. Lehman. 2008. Attributes of the ceratopsian dinosaur Torosaurus, and new material from the Javelina Formation (Maastrichtian) of Texas. Journal of Paleontology 82(6): 1127-1138. *Hunt, ReBecca K. 2006. Middle Proterozoic Paleontology of the Belt Supergroup, Glacier National Park. Pages 57–62 in S.G. Lucas, J.A. Spielmann, P.M. Hester, J.P. Kenworthy, and V.L. Santucci (ed.s), Fossils from Federal Lands: 7th Federal Fossil Conference. New Mexico Museum of Natural History and Science Bulletin 34. *Hunt, ReBecca K., Vincent L. Santucci, and Jason P. Kenworthy. 2006. A preliminary inventory of fossil fish from National Park Service units. Pages 63–69 in S.G. Lucas, J.A. Spielmann, P.M. Hester, J.P. Kenworthy, and V.L. Santucci (ed.s), Fossils from Federal Lands: 7th Federal Fossil Conference. New Mexico Museum of Natural History and Science Bulletin 34. *Hunt, ReBecca K., Daniel Chure, and Leo Carson Davis. 2003. An early Cretaceous theropod foot from southwestern Arkansas. Pages 87–103 in Proceedings of the 2003 Arkansas Undergraduate Research Conference.

External links

*
MyFossil Featured Paleontologist: ReBecca Hunt-Foster

Rock-Head Sciences District Paleontologist, ReBecca Hunt-Foster @paleochick: A Day in the GeoLife Series

Beyond the Microscope Episode 32: Bureau of Land (Before Time) Management
{{DEFAULTSORT:Hunt-Foster, ReBecca Living people American paleontologists Women paleontologists University of Arkansas alumni Year of birth missing (living people)