Zhonghe Zhou

Photo: Liwang Jin, Xinhua News Agency. Zhonghe Zhou began his career at Nanjing University in 1982, studying paleontology and stratigraphy. He received a Master of Science from the Graduate School of the Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS), after which he went on to work at the Institute of Vertebrate Paleontology and Paleoanthropology (IVPP) CAS in Beijing, before attending graduate school at the University of Kansas, where he received his PhD in Biology with Honors in 1999. From there, he returned to the IVPP to continue his research on vertebrate paleontology. His main interest is the origin and early evolution of birds, feathers and avian flight. He is also involved in the study of Mesozoic fish, feathered dinosaurs, pterosaurs, and their paleoenviornmental background. He is currently the director and a senior research fellow at the IVPP, a foreign associate of the National Academy of Sciences of the USA and member of the CAS.