Ted Daeschler, PhD

Daeschler has been at the Academy since 1987 and joined the faculty of Drexel’s Department of Biodiversity, Earth and Environmental Science upon its founding in 2012. His responsibilities at the Academy focus on research, collections building and on public programs within the museum. He served as a scientific advisor for the renovation of the Academy’s Dinosaur Hall and a variety of other paleontological exhibits.

Daeschler’s research in vertebrate paleontology focuses on the vertebrate fauna of the Late Devonian Period (385-363 million-years-ago) in eastern North America, including the well-known transitional fish fossil Tiktaalik roseae, which he co-discovered. The research involves active fossil collecting, systematic work focusing on freshwater vertebrates and the nature of early non-marine ecosystems. Fossil discoveries from the incompletely-known Late Devonian interval help answer questions about the diversification of major groups of fishes, the origin of limbed vertebrates, and the invasion of land by plants and animals.