Paul Smith

Paul Smith is Professor Emeritus of Natural History at the University of Oxford, and from 2012 until 2024 was director of Oxford University Museum of Natural History. He has over 35 years’ experience of working in the museum sector in Cambridge, Copenhagen and Birmingham, where he was also director of the Lapworth Museum of Geology. Paul is a geologist and palaeobiologist who has also undertaken academic leadership roles – prior to taking up the post at OUMNH he was head of the School of Geography, Earth & Environmental Sciences at the University of Birmingham, and he holds an honorary professorship there.

In 2014, Paul and colleagues in the Saïd Business School and Oxford University museums (including Lucy Shaw and Pegram Harrison of CAO) launched Oxford Cultural Leaders, a programme for emerging leaders across the cultural sector internationally. He has served as co-chair of the University Museums Group and has represented the Oxford University museums on the National Museum Directors Council. Paul has also served as a trustee for a number of museums, including Compton Verney and Avoncroft Museum of Historic Buildings.

Paul has wide-ranging research interests across geology and palaeobiology, and in the application of digital technologies to science museums, particularly in the areas of 3D visualisation, and in the evaluation of user experience.

Much of Paul’s geological work has been focussed on the geology of Arctic areas, and he has forty years of expedition and field research experience in Greenland and Svalbard. He was awarded the Polar Medal by H.M. the Queen for his Arctic research in 2017.