Дженнифер Клэк: Жизнь и вклад в палеонтологию тетрапод.

English paleontologist and evolutionary biologist (1947–2020)

Jennifer Alice Clack, (née Agnew; 3 November 1947 – 26 March 2020) was an English palaeontologist and evolutionary biologist. She specialised in the early evolution of tetrapods, specifically studying the "fish to tetrapod" transition: the origin, evolutionary development and radiation of early tetrapods and their relatives among the lobe finned fishes. She is best known for her book Gaining Ground: the Origin and Early Evolution of Tetrapods, published in 2002 (second edition, 2012) and written with the layperson in mind. Clack was curator at the Museum of Zoology and Professor of Vertebrate Palaeontology at the University of Cambridge, where she devoted her career to studying the early development of tetrapods, the "four legged" animals said to have evolved from Devonian lobe finned fishes and colonised the freshwater swamps of the Carboniferous period.

Clack was born on 3 November 1947, the only child of Ernest and Alice Agnew. She was brought up in Manchester, England. She was educated at Bolton School (Girls' Division), a private school in Bolton, Lancashire. She received a B. Sc. in Zoology from the University of Newcastle upon Tyne in 1970. In 1978, she accepted an invitation from Alec Panchen to obtain a Ph. D. from the same university, at the encouragement of her then new boyfriend Rob Clack. They married in 1980. Her doctorate was completed in 1984. She also held a Graduate Certificate in Museum Studies from the University of Leicester and an MA from the University of Cambridge. On 9 December 2000, she was awarded a Doctor of Science (ScD) degree by the University of Cambridge.

Clack died on 26 March 2020 at the age of 72, after a five year battle with endometrial cancer.

In 2008, Clack was awarded the Daniel Giraud Elliot Medal from the U. S. National Academy of Sciences, the first woman to achieve the honor. In 2009, Clack was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society, the first female vertebrate paleontologist to achieve the honor. She has also been elected a Foreign Honorary Member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. On 15 June 2013, Clack was awarded an honorary Doctor of Science (DSc) degree by the University of Chicago. The university described her as "an internationally preeminent palaeontologist whose research has profoundly changed the understanding of the origin of terrestrial vertebrate life." Also in 2013, she was awarded the T Neville George Medal by the Geological Society of Glasgow. On 17 July 2014, she was awarded an honorary Doctor of Science degree by the University of Leicester. Also in 2014, she was made an Honorary Foreign Member of the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences. In 2018, she won the Palaeontological Association's most prestigious award, the Lapworth Medal.