Victoria Herridge facts for kids

Victoria Louise "Tori" Herridge, born in 1980, is a super cool palaeontologist! She works at the famous Natural History Museum in London. A palaeontologist is like a detective who studies ancient life, especially fossils, to learn about creatures that lived long, long ago. Tori also helped start a group called TrowelBlazers. This group celebrates amazing women who work in archaeology (studying human history through digging up old things), palaeontology, and geology (studying Earth's rocks and history).

Becoming a Scientist: Tori's Journey

Tori Herridge loved science from a young age. She went to University College London and earned a top degree in biology in 2002. Biology is the study of living things. After that, she continued her studies at Imperial College London for a master's degree.

Uncovering Ancient Mysteries: Dwarf Elephants

Tori then went back to University College London to get her PhD, which is a very high degree. Her special research was about "Dwarf Elephants on Mediterranean Islands." Imagine elephants that were much smaller than today's elephants! She studied how these tiny elephants evolved on islands in the Mediterranean Sea. This is a great example of something called Parallel Evolution, where different animals develop similar traits in similar environments.

Her research looked at how island animals changed during the Pleistocene period, which was a time of big ice ages. She studied how these animals reacted to huge changes in climate. It's like figuring out how ancient animals survived when the world around them was changing a lot!

Sharing Science: Tori on TV and More

Tori Herridge doesn't just do amazing research; she also loves to share science with everyone! She's a fantastic science communicator, which means she makes complex science easy and fun to understand.

Awards and Writing About Science

In 2012, Tori gave an important talk called the Charles Lyell Award lecture at the British Science Festival. She also helped write a film for the Natural History Museum called Who Do You Think You Really Are?, which won an award in 2011.

Tori is also a popular science writer. She writes articles that help people understand big science ideas. For example, she wrote about whether it's right to clone mammoths (ancient, furry elephants) and why it's so important to save today's endangered elephants. She also wrote about why we should learn about the history of women in science. These articles were published in The Guardian, a well-known newspaper.

Tori on Television: Exploring the Past

You might have seen Tori on TV! In 2014, she helped present a Channel 4 show about examining a frozen mammoth found in Siberia, nicknamed "Buttercup." It was like a real-life science mystery!

In 2016, she presented another Channel 4 series called Walking Through Time. She also co-presented three series of Britain at Low Tide (in 2016, 2018, and 2019). In this show, she explored amazing historical sites that only appear when the tide is very low. In 2020, Tori presented Bone Detectives: Britain's Buried Secrets on Channel 4, where she investigated ancient bones to uncover secrets about the past.

Tori Herridge is a great example of how science can be exciting and how scientists can help us understand our world, both past and present!