Chicago Tribune | Fossil fascination leads to prize

Stephen Brusatte sees more than just a large chunk of bumpy plastic as he's running his narrow fingers over the cast of an ancient fossil.

The worn, red and black likeness, a re-creation of a bone fragment left behind by a giant meat eater with a name 19 letters long, is just the type of tool he'll need to hold the interest of those who might otherwise yawn at such a finding.

Brusatte, 21-year-old senior at the University of Chicago, learned this month that he won the prestigious British Marshall Scholarship, which will allow him to study in England for two years.

Founded in 1953 as a gesture of thanks for the Marshall Plan--the U.S. effort to rebuild Europe after World War II--the scholarships were awarded to 43 students this year.

"We are really looking for people who are going to be leaders in their field, whether it's physics, modern dance, development economics or music," said Caroline Cracraft, vice consul for the British Consulate General of Chicago.

For Brusatte, who stares at the relics with an almost childlike delight, the program will allow him access to some of the most accomplished people in his field. It will also give him a chance to examine some of the country's many fossils as he tries to fill in the blanks of a timeline that spans at least a hundred million years.

Most importantly, though, the scholarship will bring him closer to his ultimate goal: making science more accessible to everyone.

Brusatte, who got his first dinosaur book published as a teen, wants people to look to the ancient world so they can better understand modern-day problems such as AIDS, bird flu, hurricanes and global warning.

"This," he said, his hands on the cast, "can inspire a lot of people. It's easier to teach this than organic chemistry. There's a lot of awe, especially with kids. It can get them enthusiastic about science, schoolwork and reading."

Brusatte's interest in dinosaurs was sparked years ago by his younger brother, who as a child could rattle off the names of scores of prehistoric creatures. Brusatte was hooked by his freshman year of high school and started to map out a narrow path that would lead him to exactly where he wanted to be--working alongside the masters.

He went on digs with his high school teachers and added heavyweights, including dinosaur expert Paul Sereno, to his Rolodex.

"He's very together and devoted and passionate about what he does, and it's really great to see that in such a young person," said Sereno, a professor at the U. of C. "What you need in science doesn't happen by luck. You've got to be willing to sharpen your wits about something you know very little about. What a lot of students will do is run away from what they don't know. But Steve is not one to do that."

And his enthusiasm is contagious, Sereno said, whether he's teaching an impromptu lesson in the field among fellow students or reaching out to high school students.

Joe Jakupcak, Brusatte's former geology teacher at Ottawa Township High School, said the young man had been networking since he was a kid.

"Steve has known what he wanted to do from a much earlier age than any of us did," he said. "He's been right where he's supposed to be ever since."

Brusatte wrote his book about dinosaurs before he graduated from high school. In it, he chronicled the official state fossils of states that have them, a simple way to get people interested in the bones found in their backyards.

"Paleontology and geology gives us the perspective of deep time," Brusatte said. "It's the only way we can understand evolution and how the Earth worked before humans. We are stewards of the past, historians. This is the record of what things were like."

The book is an extension of a process he's been part of for years. Brusatte has spent hours measuring old bones, coding them, looking for characteristics that can help him place each relic on the proper branch of a complex family tree. That way, he said, he can figure out each fragment's place in evolution, learn what the climate was like, how much the continents had moved over time.

"It's like being a detective or an investigative reporter," he said. "It's like a big puzzle. You have clues, but you have to reconstruct the story."

And there's just something amazing about being the first human to ever see these bones, he said.

Michael LaBarbera recalls an outing in which Brusatte went off in search of dead birds on a beach in Mexico. It was a macabre but fruitful study that allowed the young man to learn which animal bones disappear first after death.

For those interested in dinosaurs, birds are the best living models, LaBarbera said.

"There's very little work done on that," said LaBarbera, a professor at U. of C. "We're very proud of Steve."

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jnapolitano@tribune.com

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Fossil fascination leads to prize