Shona Margaret Bell (married name Grant-Taylor, 1924[1][better source needed] – 7 December 2011) was a New Zealand palaeontologist.[2][3]

She studied the fossils of the Corbies Creek area of North Otago[4] and the Benmore Dam area.[5] The 1954 Directory of New Zealand Science records her as an assistant palaeontologist at the Geological Survey of New Zealand.[6] She was employed by GSNZ from 1948 to 1950, but resigned on her marriage to Tom Grant-Taylor, as was expected at the time.[7]

In 2011 a newly discovered genus of fossil in the Codiaceae family was named Shonabellia in her honour by Gregory Retallack. The type species Shonabellia verrucosa was found near Benmore Dam, an area where Bell was the first to describe fossil plants.[5]

References edit

  1. ^ "Search results list: "Shona Margaret Bell"". Ancestry. Retrieved 8 September 2017.
  2. ^ "Bell, Shona M." Index of Botanists. Harvard University Herbaria & Libraries. Retrieved 8 September 2017.
  3. ^ "Death Notice & Guest Book Preview for Shona Grant-Taylor". New Zealand Herald. Retrieved 8 September 2017.
  4. ^ Gair, H.S.; Gregg, D.R.; Speden, I.G. (1962). "Triassic fossils from Corbies Creek, North Otago". New Zealand Journal of Geology and Geophysics. 5: 94. doi:10.1080/00288306.1962.10420112. Retrieved 8 September 2017.
  5. ^ a b Retallack, G.J. (1983). "Middle Triassic megafossil marine algae and land plants from near Benmore Dam, southern Canterbury, New Zealand". Journal of the Royal Society of New Zealand. 13 (3): 129–154. doi:10.1080/03036758.1983.10415325.
  6. ^ Scientists, New Zealand Association of (1951). Directory of Science of New Zealand. p. 52.
  7. ^ Simon Nathan (May 2020). "Women in New Zealand Geoscience". GSNZ Journal of the Historical Studies Group. 65. Wikidata Q104980956.
  8. ^ International Plant Names Index.  S.M.Bell.