Rate My Professor Thomas Ezard

Professor Thomas H. G. Ezard serves as Professor and Associate Dean for Education in the Faculty of Natural and Environmental Sciences at the University of Southampton. He leads the Southampton Interdisciplinary Evolutionary Ecology (SIEVE) research group, based within Ocean and Earth Science at the National Oceanography Centre Southampton. As an evolutionary ecologist, Ezard investigates how the structure of individuals, populations, and communities interacts with environmental change to drive ecological and evolutionary dynamics. His primary research interests encompass bridging microevolution to macroevolution, scaling ecological dynamics from individuals to ecosystems, and utilizing demography for insights into conservation and life history evolution. Ezard frequently employs planktonic foraminifera as model organisms, capitalizing on their extensive fossil record, geochemical signatures, and amenability to advanced imaging techniques such as X-ray computed tomography and computer vision for precise trait measurement and analysis.

Ezard's scholarly output includes over 77 publications, with recent contributions such as 'From instance segmentation to 3D growth trajectory reconstruction in Planktonic foraminifera' (Lin et al., 2025), 'Detecting environmentally dependent developmental plasticity in fossilized individuals' (Brombacher et al., 2025), 'Ten recommendations for scanning foraminifera by X-ray computed tomography' (Searle-Barnes et al., 2025), 'Morphology of Pulleniatina (planktonic foraminifera) from optical microscopy, micro-CT, and SEM investigations' (Fabbrini et al., 2025), and 'Life histories are not just fast or slow' (Stott et al., 2024). He has developed key software tools including the foram3D R package for automated trait measurements from CT scans and the 3DKMI MATLAB package for generating shape signatures in species delimitation. Previously affiliated with Imperial College London, Ezard has secured funding from NERC for projects exploring developmental plasticity in speciation. His influence extends through editorial service as Associate Editor for Proceedings of the Royal Society B and Evolution, Council Member of the British Ecological Society (2017-2023), and membership in The Micropalaeontological Society. These roles underscore his impact on advancing quantitative methods in palaeobiology, evolutionary theory, and conservation demography.