Thomas D. Carr is a vertebrate

Vertebrate

Vertebrates are animals that are members of the subphylum Vertebrata . Vertebrates are the largest group of chordates, with currently about 58,000 species described. Vertebrates include the jawless fishes, bony fishes, sharks and rays, amphibians, reptiles, mammals, and birds...

 paleontologist who received his Ph.D.

Ph.D.

A Ph.D. is a Doctor of Philosophy, an academic degree.Ph.D. may also refer to:* Ph.D. , a 1980s British group*Piled Higher and Deeper, a web comic strip*PhD: Phantasy Degree, a Korean comic series* PhD Docbook renderer, an XML renderer...

 from the University of Toronto

University of Toronto

The University of Toronto is a public research university in Toronto, Ontario, Canada, situated on the grounds that surround Queen's Park. It was founded by royal charter in 1827 as King's College, the first institution of higher learning in Upper Canada...

 in 2005. He is now a member of the biology

Biology

Biology is a natural science concerned with the study of life and living organisms, including their structure, function, growth, origin, evolution, distribution, and taxonomy. Biology is a vast subject containing many subdivisions, topics, and disciplines...

 faculty at Carthage College

Carthage College

Carthage College is a private liberal arts college affiliated with the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America. Situated in Kenosha, Wisconsin midway between Chicago, Illinois and Milwaukee, Wisconsin, the campus is on the shore of Lake Michigan and is home to 2,500 full-time and 900 part-time...

 in Kenosha, Wisconsin

Wisconsin

Wisconsin is a U.S. state located in the north-central United States and is part of the Midwest. It is bordered by Minnesota to the west, Iowa to the southwest, Illinois to the south, Lake Michigan to the east, Michigan to the northeast, and Lake Superior to the north. Wisconsin's capital is...

. Much of his work centers on tyrannosauroid dinosaur

Dinosaur

Dinosaurs are a diverse group of animals of the clade and superorder Dinosauria. They were the dominant terrestrial vertebrates for over 160 million years, from the late Triassic period until the end of the Cretaceous , when the Cretaceous–Paleogene extinction event led to the extinction of...

s. Carr published the first quantitative analysis of tyrannosaurid ontogeny

Ontogeny

Ontogeny is the origin and the development of an organism – for example: from the fertilized egg to mature form. It covers in essence, the study of an organism's lifespan...

 in 1999, establishing that several previously-recognized genera

Genera

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 and species

Species

In biology, a species is one of the basic units of biological classification and a taxonomic rank. A species is often defined as a group of organisms capable of interbreeding and producing fertile offspring. While in many cases this definition is adequate, more precise or differing measures are...

 of tyrannosaurids were in fact juveniles of other recognized taxa. Carr shared the Lanzendorf Prize for scientific illustration at the 2000 Society of Vertebrate Paleontology

Society of Vertebrate Paleontology

The Society of Vertebrate Paleontology was founded in 1940 for individuals with an interest in vertebrate paleontology. SVP now has almost 2,000 members. The society's website states that SVP "is organized exclusively for educational and scientific purposes...

 conference for the artwork in this article. In 2005, he and two colleagues described and named Appalachiosaurus

Appalachiosaurus

Appalachiosaurus is a genus of tyrannosauroid theropod dinosaur from the Late Cretaceous Period of eastern North America. Like almost all theropods, it was a bipedal predator. Only a juvenile skeleton has been found, representing an animal over 7 meters long and weighing over...

, a late-surviving basal

Basal (phylogenetics)

In phylogenetics, a basal clade is the earliest clade to branch in a larger clade; it appears at the base of a cladogram.A basal group forms an outgroup to the rest of the clade, such as in the following example:...

 tyrannosauroid found in Alabama

Alabama

Alabama is a state located in the southeastern region of the United States. It is bordered by Tennessee to the north, Georgia to the east, Florida and the Gulf of Mexico to the south, and Mississippi to the west. Alabama ranks 30th in total land area and ranks second in the size of its inland...

. He is also curator for the Dinosaur Discovery Museum

Dinosaur Discovery Museum

Dinosaur Discovery Museum in Kenosha, Wisconsin, USA, is dedicated to the exploration and explication of the relationship between modern birds and ancient carnivorous biped dinosaurs, the theropods, which include Carnotaurus, Tyrannosaurus rex, and Velociraptor. This link is especially well...

in Kenosha, Wisconsin.

Selected publications

• Carr, Thomas D. (1999). "Craniofacial ontogeny in Tyrannosauridae (Dinosauria, Coelurosauria)." Journal of Vertebrate Paleontology 19 (3): 497-520.
• Carr, Thomas D.; Williamson, Thomas E.; & Schwimmer, David R. (2005). "A new genus and species of tyrannosauroid from the Late Cretaceous (middle Campanian) Demopolis Formation of Alabama." Journal of Vertebrate Paleontology 25 (1): 119–143.