Dave Hone

Hone studied zoology at the University of Bristol in 1996–1999, took an M.Sc. at the Natural History Museum, London, and Imperial College in 2000–2001, and completed a Ph.D. in vertebrate palaeontology at Bristol in 2002–2005 under Michael J. Benton.⁠[1]

After completing his Ph.D., he held postdoctoral and teaching positions in Munich, Beijing and Dublin.⁠[2]

In China he took part in fieldwork at Bayan Mandahu in Inner Mongolia, in Henan and Liaoning, and at the dinosaur quarries of Zhucheng in Shandong, and was involved in the work at the “dinosaur death pits” of Xinjiang.⁠[3]

On April 1, 2011, Hone, then at the University College Dublin School of Biology and Environmental Science, was lead author of a paper published online in Cretaceous Research with Xu Xing of the Institute of Vertebrate Paleontology and Paleoanthropology and others, naming Zhuchengtyrannus magnus, a giant tyrannosaurine from Zhucheng in Shandong estimated at about 11 metres long and nearly 6 tonnes.⁠[4]

In 2012 he joined the biological sciences school at Queen Mary University of London, where he teaches numerous modules and leads student field courses to places such as South Africa and Canada.⁠[2]

From 2012 to 2018 he wrote regularly for The Guardian’s “Lost Worlds” palaeontology blog, also writing for National Geographic and New Scientist, and served as a scientific consultant on documentaries including the BBCBBCThe BBC (British Broadcasting Corporation) is the United Kingdom’s public broadcaster. Its predecessor was the British Broadcasting Company, formed in 1922, and since 1927 it has been established under a Royal Charter. It provides television, radio, and online services in the UK, is funded mainly by the television licence fee, and broadcasts worldwide in multiple languages through BBC World Service.Open the full entry’s The Real T. rex with Chris Packham, Channel 5’s Dinosaur with Stephen Fry and David Attenborough’s Conquest of the Skies.⁠[5]

On July 5, 2016, Bloomsbury Sigma published his popular science book The Tyrannosaur Chronicles: The Biology of the Tyrant Dinosaurs, tracing more than 100 million years of tyrannosaur history and over a century of research; Kirkus Reviews said he successfully integrated the story of how knowledge of the animals was pieced together with what can be inferred about them.⁠[6]

In September 2019 he was lead author, with Michael Habib and François Therrien, of a Journal of Vertebrate Paleontology paper showing that remains found about 30 years earlier in Alberta, Canada, and long assigned to Quetzalcoatlus belonged to a new species, Cryodrakon boreas, the first new pterosaur species discovered in Canada.⁠[7]

A paper in Nature on April 29, 2020, had argued that Spinosaurus was largely an aquatic predator that swam with its tail to pursue fish; on January 26, 2021, he and Thomas R. Holtz Jr. published a study in Palaeontologia Electronica arguing that, although it likely fed from the water, it was poorly adapted to aquatic pursuit and was more like a giant heron or stork snatching fish from the shoreline. He said the wading idea was “much better supported.”⁠[8]

In September 2021 a study he co-authored described two early spinosaurids from England’s Isle of Wight, Ceratosuchops inferodios and Riparovenator milnerae, where Baryonyx had previously been the only spinosaurid known in the UK; as a senior lecturer at Queen Mary he noted that two closely related carnivores in one ecosystem is actually very common.⁠[9]

In March 2022 Hodder & Stoughton published his The Future of Dinosaurs: What We Don’t Know, What We Can, and What We’ll Never Know in the UK, issued in the United States by Princeton UniversityPrinceton UniversityPrinceton University is a private university and Ivy League member in Princeton, New Jersey. Chartered on October 22, 1746 as the College of New Jersey, it moved to Princeton in 1756 and adopted its present name in 1896. Undergraduate education leads to A.B. and B.S.E. degrees and emphasizes small-group discussion, independent research and residential college life. Graduate education spans the humanities, social sciences, natural sciences and engineering. As of October 2026, Christopher L. Eisgruber was president. Its 2026–27 operating budget was $3.407 billion, including $342 million for undergraduate aid.Open the full entry Press as How Fast Did T. Rex Run?, at 288 pages; reviewer Ben Hillesheim called it a comprehensive overview of the state of dinosaur science that remains accessible.⁠[10]

Anthropologist Barbara J. King wrote that the book balances what is known and unknown, explaining advances such as inferring dinosaur colours from melanosomes, while criticizing inconsistent figures in the book for how long dinosaurs reigned.⁠[11]

In March 2022 a study proposed splitting Tyrannosaurus rex into T. rex, “T. imperator” and “T. regina”; on July 25, 2022, a rebuttal led by the American Museum of Natural History and Carthage College, with Hone as co-author, appeared in Evolutionary Biology, finding the evidence insufficient. He said there was still a good chance of more than one Tyrannosaurus species but that strong evidence was needed.⁠[12]

On June 10, 2024, writing in The Guardian about a Stegosaurus skeleton expected to sell at auction for about $6 million, he said most palaeontologists regard fossils as scientific objects that belong in museums for protection and study, and argued that high-priced sales encourage illegal excavation and smuggling and leave many important specimens with private collectors, unavailable for research.⁠[13]

In November 2024 Princeton University Press published his Uncovering Dinosaur Behavior: What They Did and How We Know, illustrated by Gabriel Ugueto, at 232 pages, explaining how palaeontologists infer dinosaur social behaviour and diet from fossils and from birds and crocodiles; Publishers Weekly praised his candor about scientific uncertainty.⁠[14]

His website says the book has appeared in Spanish and was due in a simplified Chinese translation in 2026.⁠[15]

In November 2024 a team he led described in Current Biology a new pterosaur from southern Germany, Skiphosoura bavarica (“sword tail from Bavaria”); the nearly complete, three-dimensionally preserved specimen, about 2 metres in wingspan, helps explain the transition from early pterosaurs to the pterodactyloids.⁠[16]

On September 4, 2025, he appeared on episode #480 of the Lex FridmanLex FridmanLex Fridman is a Soviet-born, US-raised computer scientist and podcast host who works as an MIT research scientist on human-AI interaction and autonomous driving. His Lex Fridman Podcast is known for hours-long conversations with guests including heads of state and technology leaders.Open the full entry Podcast, discussing T. rex size, hunting and bite force, the history of dinosaurs, a $31.8 million T. rex fossil, what Jurassic Park got wrong and right, sexual selection, Spinosaurus, dinosaur extinction and birds as dinosaurs.⁠[17]

In November 2025 Bloomsbury Sigma published Spinosaur Tales: The Biology and Ecology of the Spinosaurs, a 320-page book he wrote with palaeoartist Mark P. Witton; an NHBS review praised the authors’ careful, nuanced treatment of this controversial group, noting their view that Spinosaurus ate fish but would have been a poor swimmer.⁠[18]

As of October 2026 he is Reader in Zoology and Director of Outreach at Queen Mary University of London’s School of Biological and Behavioural Sciences, researching the behaviour and ecology of non-avian dinosaurs, especially theropods, and pterosaurs, including body-size evolution, sexual selection, bite marks and stomach contents.⁠[19]

He co-hosts the dinosaur podcast Terrible Lizards with Iszi Lawrence and writes the blog “Archosaur Musings.”⁠[20]

He says Terrible Lizards has run for nearly five years with more than 2 million listens; he set up the question-and-answer site Ask A Biologist in 2006 and ran it until 2023, answering more than 10,000 biology queries.⁠[21]

Other taxa he has helped name include the feathered Anchiornis huxleyi, Limusaurus inextricabilis, the first herbivorous form known from a carnivorous group, Shaochilong maortuensis, the first carcharodontosaur identified from Asia, and the German pterosaur Bellubrunnus rothgaengeri.⁠[22]

Personal website: Public link: https://www.davehone.co.uk/ (opens in a new window)⁠[17]

X: Public account: https://x.com/Dave_Hone (opens in a new window)⁠[21]

LinkedInLinkedInLinkedIn is a social networking platform for professionals. It was founded in 2002 by Reid Hoffman and others, launched in 2003, and listed on the New York Stock Exchange in 2011; after Microsoft acquired it for approximately $26.2 billion in 2016, it became a wholly owned Microsoft subsidiary. Its revenue comes from membership subscriptions, advertising, and recruitment solutions.Open the full entry: Public profile: https://www.linkedin.com/in/david-hone-6064792b3/ (opens in a new window)⁠[21]

Queen Mary University of London: Official website: https://www.qmul.ac.uk/ (opens in a new window)⁠[17]