Prospective Students

Abagael R West

  • Teaching Assistant Professor

Contact

abw39@pitt.edu
Office: (412) 624-4269
A352 Langley Hall
5th & Ruskin Ave.
Pittsburgh, PA 15260
View Website ›

I study the morphological evolution and phylogenetic relationships of extinct and extant placental mammals, and the biogeography of South America and Antarctica during the late Cretaceous through early Paleogene. I am also interested in how students learn tree-thinking and hypothesis-testing, and in aligning how these processes are taught with how they are practiced. 

West, AR, CR Torres, JA Clarke, JA Case, and MC La

West, AR, CR Torres, JA Clarke, JA Case, and MC Lamanna. 2019. Description of an avian femur from Vega Island, Antarctic Peninsula: removing the record of cursorial land birds from the Cretaceous of Antarctica. PeerJ 7:e7231 https://doi.org/10.7717/peerj.7231

Lamanna, MC, JA Case, EM Roberts, VM Arbour, RC El

Lamanna, MC, JA Case, EM Roberts, VM Arbour, RC Ely, SW Salisbury, JA Clarke, E Malinzak, AR West, and PM O’Connor. 2019. Late Cretaceous non-avian dinosaurs from the James Ross Basin, Antarctica: description of new material, updated synthesis, biostratigraphy, and paleobiogeography. Advances in Polar Science. 30(3): 228-250. doi: 10.13679/j.advps.2019.0007

Geiger, M, AR West, SE Marron, and RJ Asher. 2018.

Geiger, M, AR West, SE Marron, and RJ Asher. 2018. Influences of domestication and island evolution on dental growth in Ovis. Journal of Mammalian Evolution p.1-16. http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s10914-018-9452-y

Wible, JR and AR West. 2017. The basicranial axis

Wible, JR and AR West. 2017. The basicranial axis in the rock hyrax, Procavia capensis (Pallas, 1766) (Mammalia, Afrotheria, Hyracoidea): novel structure of the frontal bone. Annals of Carnegie Museum 84(4): 287-300. https://doi.org/10.2992/007.084.0403

West, AR 2016. Mitogenome of the extinct helmeted

West, AR 2016. Mitogenome of the extinct helmeted musk ox, Bootherium bombifrons. Mitochondrial DNA Part B: Resources 1: 862-863. https://doi.org/10.1080/23802359.2016.1250136

Dr. West earned their PhD from Columbia University in a joint program with the American Museum of Natural History. They completed a postdoctoral fellowship at Carnegie Museum of Natural History and joined the Department in 2018.