fbpx
Wikipedia

Robert McNeill Alexander

November 26, 2023

Robert McNeill (Neill) Alexander, CBE FRS[1][2] (7 July 1934 – 21 March 2016) was a British zoologist[3][4][5] and a leading authority in the field of biomechanics. For thirty years he was Professor of Zoology at the University of Leeds.

R. McNeill Alexander

CBE FRS
Born7 July 1934 
Died21 March 2016  (aged 81)

Early life and education edit

Alexander was born in Lisburn, Northern Ireland, one of the four sons of Robert Alexander and his wife Janet McNeill. His father was the chief engineer of the city of Belfast. His mother was a novelist and playwright who wrote more than 20 children’s books and two opera libretti. He was educated at Tonbridge School and at Trinity Hall, Cambridge where he gained an MA and a PhD.[6] His PhD research at Cambridge was supervised by Professor Sir James Gray, FRS.[3] Subsequently, he was awarded a DSc by the University of Wales.[5][7]

Academic career edit

Alexander was a Lecturer at the University College of North Wales (now Bangor University) from 1958 to 1969 and then Professor of Zoology at the University of Leeds from 1969 until his retirement in 1999, when the title of emeritus professor was conferred upon him.[8]

Until 1970, he was mainly concerned with fish, investigating the mechanics of swim bladders, tails and fish jaw mechanisms. Subsequently, he concentrated on the mechanics of terrestrial locomotion, notably walking and running in mammals, particularly on gait selection and its relationship to anatomy and the structural design of skeletons and muscles.[1]

Alexander was particularly interested in the mechanics of dinosaur locomotion.[9] He developed a formula to calculate the speed of motion of dinosaurs, the so-called 'dinosaur speed calculator,' mathematically derived from the Froude number:

"The key to deriving estimates of dinosaur gait and speed from trackways was provided by the zoologist R. McNeill Alexander (1976). From observations of modern animals, he derived a general relationship between an animal's speed of locomotion (v) and its hip height (h) and its stride length (SL), which is
 
Alexander also pointed out that this formula could be applied to dinosaur trackways since the stride length can be measured directly and the hip height could be estimated from the size of the foot print."[10]

Originally, Alexander stated: "I have now obtained a relationship between speed, stride length and body size from observations of living animals and applied this to dinosaurs to achieve estimates of their speeds. The estimated speeds are rather low—between 1.0 and 3.6 ms−1."[11]

Modifications to the original formula gave rise to revised estimates, and "Alexander (1996) argued that based on the bone dimensions of Tyrannosaurus it is unlikely they could have travelled at more than 8ms−1."[12] Several calculations using variants of the formula indicate that dinosaurs probably travelled at around 3 ms−1 with a top speed of 8 ms−1. This translates to a speed range of roughly 6–20 mph.

Alexander was secretary of the Zoological Society of London (1992–1999) which included supervising the management of London and Whipsnade Zoos. He was president of the Society for Experimental Biology (1995–1997), President of the International Society of Vertebrate Morphologists (1997–2001) and editor of the Proceedings of the Royal Society B (1998–2004).[13] Alexander specialised in research on animal mechanics and published numerous books and research papers in the field from 1959.

Film and TV work edit

  • Horizon (1976) TV series documentary
  • The Hot-Blooded Dinosaurs (1976)
  • The Dinosaurs! (1992)
  • Walking with Beasts (2001) TV series documentary (principal scientific advisor)
  • The Future Is Wild (2003) TV series documentary
  • Extinct: A Horizon Guide to Dinosaurs (2001) TV documentary[14]

Honours and awards edit

Alexander received several awards and honours during his career including:

Personal life edit

Alexander married Ann Elizabeth Coulton in 1961. They had a son and a daughter.[5][17]

Death edit

Alexander died in 2016, aged 81. He was survived by his wife and children.[18]

Selected publications edit

Books edit

  • Functional Design in Fishes, Hutchinson University Library, 1967, 1970
  • Animal Mechanics, Sidgwick & Jackson, 1968
  • Size and Shape, Edward Arnold, 1971
  • The Chordates, Cambridge University Press, 1975
  • Mechanics and energetics of animal locomotion, with G. Goldspink, Halsted Press, 1977
  • The Invertebrates, Cambridge University Press, 1979
  • Optima for Animals, Hodder Arnold, 1982
  • Locomotion of animals, Springer, 1985
  • The Collins Encyclopedia of Animal Biology, HarperCollins Publishers, 1986
  • Elastic Mechanisms in Animal Movement, Cambridge University Press, 1988
  • Dynamics of Dinosaurs and other Extinct Giants, Columbia University Press, 1989
  • Animals, Cambridge University Press, 1990
  • How dinosaurs ran, Scientific American, 1991
  • Animals, Cambridge University Press, 1991
  • The Human Machine, Natural History Museum, Stationery Office Books, 1992
  • Exploring Biomechanics: Animals in Motion, W H Freeman & Co, 1992
  • Bones: The Unity of Form and Function, Macmillan General Reference, 1994
  • Energy for Animal Life, Oxford University Press, 1999
  • Exploring biomechanics: animals in motion, Scientific American Library, 1992
  • Hydraulic mechanisms in locomotion, in Body Cavities: Function and Phylogeny, pp. 187–198, Selected Symposia and Monographs, 8, Mucchi.
  • Principles of Animal Locomotion, Princeton University Press, 2003
  • Human Bones: A Scientific and Pictorial Investigation, with Aaron Diskin, Pi Press, 2004
  • Knochen! Was uns aufrecht hält - das Buch zum menschlichen Skelett, Spektrum Akademischer Verlag, 2006

Papers edit

(This is a small sample from over 250 papers[19])

  • The Densities of Cyprinidae, 1959[20]
  • Visco-elastic properties of the body-wall of sea anemones, 1962[21]
  • Adaptation in the skulls and cranial muscles of South American characinoid fish, 1964[22]
  • Estimates of speeds of dinosaurs, 1976[11]
  • Bending of cylindrical animals with helical fibres in their skin or cuticle, 1987[23]
  • Tyrannosaurus on the run, 1996[24]
  • Dinosaur biomechanics, 2006[25]
  • Biomechanics: Stable Running, 2007[26]
  • Orangutans use compliant branches to lower the energetic cost of locomotion, 2007[27]
  • Incidence of healed fracture in the skeletons of birds, molluscs and primates, 2009[28]
  • Biomechanics: Leaping lizards and dinosaurs, 2012[29]

References edit

  1. ^ a b c . London: Royal Society. Archived from the original on 17 November 2015. One or more of the preceding sentences incorporates text from the royalsociety.org website where:

    “All text published under the heading 'Biography' on Fellow profile pages is available under Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.” --. Archived from the original on 25 September 2015. Retrieved 9 March 2016.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: bot: original URL status unknown (link)
  2. ^ Alexander, Gordon (2022). "Robert McNeill Alexander. 7 July 1934—21 March 2016". Biographical Memoirs of Fellows of the Royal Society. 72: 9–32. doi:10.1098/rsbm.2021.0030. S2CID 245355098.
  3. ^ a b Biewener, Andrew A.; Wilson, Alan (2016). "R. McNeill Alexander (1934–2016) Zoologist who pioneered comparative animal biomechanics". Nature. 532 (7600): 442. doi:10.1038/532442a. PMID 27121834.
  4. ^ Portraits of (Robert) McNeill Alexander at the National Portrait Gallery, London
  5. ^ a b c "ALEXANDER, Prof. (Robert) McNeill". Who's Who & Who Was Who. Vol. 2019 (online Oxford University Press ed.). Oxford: A & C Black. (Subscription or UK public library membership required.)
  6. ^ Alexander, Robert McNeill (2015). The physical properties of the teleost swimbladder (PhD thesis). University of Cambridge.
  7. ^ The Guardian, obituary by John Lydon, published 30 May 2016
  8. ^ R McNeill Alexander academic homepage at Leeds
  9. ^ The Pterosaur Database 17 May 2008 at the Wayback Machine
  10. ^ Dinosaur speed calculator, University of Sheffield 18 May 2012 at the Wayback Machine
  11. ^ a b Alexander, R. McN. (1976). "Estimates of speeds of dinosaurs". Nature. 261 (5556): 129–130. Bibcode:1976Natur.261..129A. doi:10.1038/261129a0. S2CID 4246012.
  12. ^ "Dinosaur Tracks and Trackways - Gait and Speed". palaeo.gly.bris.ac.uk.
  13. ^ "Did You Know? – From the Archives – March 2011 « ISB Now". isbnow.isbweb.org.
  14. ^ Robert McNeill Alexander at IMDb
  15. ^ "Reporter 455, 25 September 2000". reporter.leeds.ac.uk.
  16. ^ The London Gazette, 19 June 2000, 55879, page 7
  17. ^ Publications, Europa (31 July 2018). The International Who's Who 2004. Psychology Press. ISBN 9781857432176 – via Google Books.
  18. ^ Wright, Montana (25 July 2022). "Emeritus Professor R McNeill Alexander, FRS".
  19. ^ "Robert McNeill Alexander, zoologist - obituary". The Daily Telegraph. 3 April 2016. Retrieved 3 May 2016.
  20. ^ Alexander, R. McN. The Densities of Cyprinidae J Exp Biol 36, June 1959, pp. 333–340.
  21. ^ Alexander, R. McN. Visco-elastic properties of the body-wall of sea anemones J. Exp. Biol. 39, 1962, pp. 373–386.
  22. ^ Alexander, R. McN. (1964). "Adaptation in the skulls and cranial muscles of South American characinoid fish". Journal of the Linnean Society of London, Zoology. 45 (305): 169–190. doi:10.1111/j.1096-3642.1964.tb00493.x.
  23. ^ Alexander, R. McN. (1987). "Bending of cylindrical animals with helical fibres in their skin or cuticle". Journal of Theoretical Biology. 124 (1): 97–110. Bibcode:1987JThBi.124...97A. doi:10.1016/S0022-5193(87)80255-2.
  24. ^ Alexander, R. McNeill (1996). "Tyrannosaurus on the run". Nature. 379 (6561): 121. Bibcode:1996Natur.379..121A. doi:10.1038/379121a0. S2CID 36799383.
  25. ^ Alexander, R. McN. (2006). "Dinosaur biomechanics". Proceedings of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences. 273 (1596): 1849–1855. doi:10.1098/rspb.2006.3532. PMC 1634776. PMID 16822743.  
  26. ^ Alexander, R. McNeill (2007). "Biomechanics: Stable Running". Current Biology. 17 (7): R253–R255. doi:10.1016/j.cub.2007.02.001. PMID 17407757. S2CID 16242909.
  27. ^ Alexander, R. McN.; Crompton, R. H.; Thorpe, S. K. S. (2007). "Orangutans use compliant branches to lower the energetic cost of locomotion". Biology Letters. 3 (3): 253–256. doi:10.1098/rsbl.2007.0049. PMC 2464692. PMID 17439848.
  28. ^ Brandwood, A.; Jayes, A. S.; Alexander, R. McN. (2009). "Incidence of healed fracture in the skeletons of birds, molluscs and primates". Journal of Zoology. 208 (1): 55–62. doi:10.1111/j.1469-7998.1986.tb04708.x.
  29. ^ Alexander, R. McNeill (2012). "Biomechanics: Leaping lizards and dinosaurs". Nature. 481 (7380): 148–9. Bibcode:2012Natur.481..148A. doi:10.1038/nature10797. PMID 22217939. S2CID 196596223.
Professional and academic associations
Preceded by Secretary of the
Zoological Society of London
1992–1999 		Succeeded by

November 26, 2023
robert, mcneill, alexander, robert, mcneill, neill, alexander, july, 1934, march, 2016, british, zoologist, leading, authority, field, biomechanics, thirty, years, professor, zoology, university, leeds, mcneill, alexandercbe, frsborn7, july, 1934, died21, marc. Robert McNeill Neill Alexander CBE FRS 1 2 7 July 1934 21 March 2016 was a British zoologist 3 4 5 and a leading authority in the field of biomechanics For thirty years he was Professor of Zoology at the University of Leeds R McNeill AlexanderCBE FRSBorn7 July 1934 Died21 March 2016 aged 81 Contents 1 Early life and education 2 Academic career 3 Film and TV work 4 Honours and awards 5 Personal life 6 Death 7 Selected publications 7 1 Books 7 2 Papers 8 ReferencesEarly life and education editAlexander was born in Lisburn Northern Ireland one of the four sons of Robert Alexander and his wife Janet McNeill His father was the chief engineer of the city of Belfast His mother was a novelist and playwright who wrote more than 20 children s books and two opera libretti He was educated at Tonbridge School and at Trinity Hall Cambridge where he gained an MA and a PhD 6 His PhD research at Cambridge was supervised by Professor Sir James Gray FRS 3 Subsequently he was awarded a DSc by the University of Wales 5 7 Academic career editAlexander was a Lecturer at the University College of North Wales now Bangor University from 1958 to 1969 and then Professor of Zoology at the University of Leeds from 1969 until his retirement in 1999 when the title of emeritus professor was conferred upon him 8 Until 1970 he was mainly concerned with fish investigating the mechanics of swim bladders tails and fish jaw mechanisms Subsequently he concentrated on the mechanics of terrestrial locomotion notably walking and running in mammals particularly on gait selection and its relationship to anatomy and the structural design of skeletons and muscles 1 Alexander was particularly interested in the mechanics of dinosaur locomotion 9 He developed a formula to calculate the speed of motion of dinosaurs the so called dinosaur speed calculator mathematically derived from the Froude number The key to deriving estimates of dinosaur gait and speed from trackways was provided by the zoologist R McNeill Alexander 1976 From observations of modern animals he derived a general relationship between an animal s speed of locomotion v and its hip height h and its stride length SL which is dd v 0 25 g 0 5 S L 1 67 h 1 17 displaystyle v 0 25 g 0 5 SL 1 67 h 1 17 nbsp dd dd dd dd dd dd dd Alexander also pointed out that this formula could be applied to dinosaur trackways since the stride length can be measured directly and the hip height could be estimated from the size of the foot print 10 dd Originally Alexander stated I have now obtained a relationship between speed stride length and body size from observations of living animals and applied this to dinosaurs to achieve estimates of their speeds The estimated speeds are rather low between 1 0 and 3 6 ms 1 11 Modifications to the original formula gave rise to revised estimates and Alexander 1996 argued that based on the bone dimensions of Tyrannosaurus it is unlikely they could have travelled at more than 8ms 1 12 Several calculations using variants of the formula indicate that dinosaurs probably travelled at around 3 ms 1 with a top speed of 8 ms 1 This translates to a speed range of roughly 6 20 mph Alexander was secretary of the Zoological Society of London 1992 1999 which included supervising the management of London and Whipsnade Zoos He was president of the Society for Experimental Biology 1995 1997 President of the International Society of Vertebrate Morphologists 1997 2001 and editor of the Proceedings of the Royal Society B 1998 2004 13 Alexander specialised in research on animal mechanics and published numerous books and research papers in the field from 1959 Film and TV work editHorizon 1976 TV series documentary The Hot Blooded Dinosaurs 1976 The Dinosaurs 1992 Walking with Beasts 2001 TV series documentary principal scientific advisor The Future Is Wild 2003 TV series documentary Extinct A Horizon Guide to Dinosaurs 2001 TV documentary 14 Honours and awards editAlexander received several awards and honours during his career including 1979 Linnean Medal for Zoology Linnean Society of London 1987 Elected a Fellow of the Royal Society FRS 1 2000 Birthday Honours List Commander of the Most Excellent Order of the British Empire CBE 15 16 2001 Foreign Honorary Member American Academy of Arts and Sciences 2002 Honorary Fellow Zoological Society of London 2003 Borelli Award American Society of BiomechanicsPersonal life editAlexander married Ann Elizabeth Coulton in 1961 They had a son and a daughter 5 17 Death editAlexander died in 2016 aged 81 He was survived by his wife and children 18 Selected publications editBooks edit Functional Design in Fishes Hutchinson University Library 1967 1970 Animal Mechanics Sidgwick amp Jackson 1968 Size and Shape Edward Arnold 1971 The Chordates Cambridge University Press 1975 Mechanics and energetics of animal locomotion with G Goldspink Halsted Press 1977 The Invertebrates Cambridge University Press 1979 Optima for Animals Hodder Arnold 1982 Locomotion of animals Springer 1985 The Collins Encyclopedia of Animal Biology HarperCollins Publishers 1986 Elastic Mechanisms in Animal Movement Cambridge University Press 1988 Dynamics of Dinosaurs and other Extinct Giants Columbia University Press 1989 Animals Cambridge University Press 1990 How dinosaurs ran Scientific American 1991 Animals Cambridge University Press 1991 The Human Machine Natural History Museum Stationery Office Books 1992 Exploring Biomechanics Animals in Motion W H Freeman amp Co 1992 Bones The Unity of Form and Function Macmillan General Reference 1994 Energy for Animal Life Oxford University Press 1999 Exploring biomechanics animals in motion Scientific American Library 1992 Hydraulic mechanisms in locomotion in Body Cavities Function and Phylogeny pp 187 198 Selected Symposia and Monographs 8 Mucchi Principles of Animal Locomotion Princeton University Press 2003 Human Bones A Scientific and Pictorial Investigation with Aaron Diskin Pi Press 2004 Knochen Was uns aufrecht halt das Buch zum menschlichen Skelett Spektrum Akademischer Verlag 2006 Papers edit This is a small sample from over 250 papers 19 The Densities of Cyprinidae 1959 20 Visco elastic properties of the body wall of sea anemones 1962 21 Adaptation in the skulls and cranial muscles of South American characinoid fish 1964 22 Estimates of speeds of dinosaurs 1976 11 Bending of cylindrical animals with helical fibres in their skin or cuticle 1987 23 Tyrannosaurus on the run 1996 24 Dinosaur biomechanics 2006 25 Biomechanics Stable Running 2007 26 Orangutans use compliant branches to lower the energetic cost of locomotion 2007 27 Incidence of healed fracture in the skeletons of birds molluscs and primates 2009 28 Biomechanics Leaping lizards and dinosaurs 2012 29 References edit a b c Professor McNeill Alexander CBE FRS London Royal Society Archived from the original on 17 November 2015 One or more of the preceding sentences incorporates text from the royalsociety org website where All text published under the heading Biography on Fellow profile pages is available under Creative Commons Attribution 4 0 International License Royal Society Terms conditions and policies Archived from the original on 25 September 2015 Retrieved 9 March 2016 a href Template Cite web html title Template Cite web cite web a CS1 maint bot original URL status unknown link Alexander Gordon 2022 Robert McNeill Alexander 7 July 1934 21 March 2016 Biographical Memoirs of Fellows of the Royal Society 72 9 32 doi 10 1098 rsbm 2021 0030 S2CID 245355098 a b Biewener Andrew A Wilson Alan 2016 R McNeill Alexander 1934 2016 Zoologist who pioneered comparative animal biomechanics Nature 532 7600 442 doi 10 1038 532442a PMID 27121834 Portraits of Robert McNeill Alexander at the National Portrait Gallery London a b c ALEXANDER Prof Robert McNeill Who s Who amp Who Was Who Vol 2019 online Oxford University Press ed Oxford A amp C Black Subscription or UK public library membership required Alexander Robert McNeill 2015 The physical properties of the teleost swimbladder PhD thesis University of Cambridge The Guardian obituary by John Lydon published 30 May 2016 R McNeill Alexander academic homepage at Leeds The Pterosaur Database Archived 17 May 2008 at the Wayback Machine Dinosaur speed calculator University of Sheffield Archived 18 May 2012 at the Wayback Machine a b Alexander R McN 1976 Estimates of speeds of dinosaurs Nature 261 5556 129 130 Bibcode 1976Natur 261 129A doi 10 1038 261129a0 S2CID 4246012 Dinosaur Tracks and Trackways Gait and Speed palaeo gly bris ac uk Did You Know From the Archives March 2011 ISB Now isbnow isbweb org Robert McNeill Alexander at IMDb Reporter 455 25 September 2000 reporter leeds ac uk The London Gazette 19 June 2000 55879 page 7 Publications Europa 31 July 2018 The International Who s Who 2004 Psychology Press ISBN 9781857432176 via Google Books Wright Montana 25 July 2022 Emeritus Professor R McNeill Alexander FRS Robert McNeill Alexander zoologist obituary The Daily Telegraph 3 April 2016 Retrieved 3 May 2016 Alexander R McN The Densities of Cyprinidae J Exp Biol 36 June 1959 pp 333 340 Alexander R McN Visco elastic properties of the body wall of sea anemones J Exp Biol 39 1962 pp 373 386 Alexander R McN 1964 Adaptation in the skulls and cranial muscles of South American characinoid fish Journal of the Linnean Society of London Zoology 45 305 169 190 doi 10 1111 j 1096 3642 1964 tb00493 x Alexander R McN 1987 Bending of cylindrical animals with helical fibres in their skin or cuticle Journal of Theoretical Biology 124 1 97 110 Bibcode 1987JThBi 124 97A doi 10 1016 S0022 5193 87 80255 2 Alexander R McNeill 1996 Tyrannosaurus on the run Nature 379 6561 121 Bibcode 1996Natur 379 121A doi 10 1038 379121a0 S2CID 36799383 Alexander R McN 2006 Dinosaur biomechanics Proceedings of the Royal Society B Biological Sciences 273 1596 1849 1855 doi 10 1098 rspb 2006 3532 PMC 1634776 PMID 16822743 nbsp Alexander R McNeill 2007 Biomechanics Stable Running Current Biology 17 7 R253 R255 doi 10 1016 j cub 2007 02 001 PMID 17407757 S2CID 16242909 Alexander R McN Crompton R H Thorpe S K S 2007 Orangutans use compliant branches to lower the energetic cost of locomotion Biology Letters 3 3 253 256 doi 10 1098 rsbl 2007 0049 PMC 2464692 PMID 17439848 Brandwood A Jayes A S Alexander R McN 2009 Incidence of healed fracture in the skeletons of birds molluscs and primates Journal of Zoology 208 1 55 62 doi 10 1111 j 1469 7998 1986 tb04708 x Alexander R McNeill 2012 Biomechanics Leaping lizards and dinosaurs Nature 481 7380 148 9 Bibcode 2012Natur 481 148A doi 10 1038 nature10797 PMID 22217939 S2CID 196596223 Professional and academic associationsPreceded byBarry Albert Cross Secretary of theZoological Society of London1992 1999 Succeeded byPaul H Harvey Retrieved from https en wikipedia org w index php title Robert McNeill Alexander amp oldid 1170817946, wikipedia, wiki, book, books, library,

article

, read, download, free, free download, mp3, video, mp4, 3gp, jpg, jpeg, gif, png, picture, music, song, movie, book, game, games.