Sunil Bajpai during field work near Jaisalmer City
Born
(1961-09-30) 30 September 1961 (age 62)
Nationality
Indian
Education
Ph.D. in Paleontology
Alma mater
Panjab University, Chandigarh
Occupation
Vertebrate Paleontologist
Employer(s)
Indian Institute of Technology Roorkee, Uttarakhand
Organization(s)
Former Director, Birbal Sahni Institute of Palaeosciences, Lucknow
Sunil Bajpai is the Chair Professor of Vertebrate Paleontology in the Department of Earth Sciences, Indian Institute of Technology Roorkee. He is in service as a professor at IIT Roorkee since 1st January 1996 till 30 September 2026.[1] He also served as the director of the Birbal Sahni Institute of Palaeosciences from January 2013 to July 2018.[2]
Sunil Bajpai predominantly works on the Cenozoic vertebrates of India with focus on marine mammals, such as whales and sea cows.[3][4][5][6] Bajpai and his collaborators fossil discoveries from the Eocene of Kutch (Gujarat) and the Himalayas have helped in understanding how whales have evolved.[3][4] Bajpai also works on land mammals, which includes the early representatives of horses, artiodactyls, and primates, such as the stem perissodactyl family Cambaytheriidae, artiodactyl Gujaratia, and primates such as the adapoid Marcgodinotius and the omomyid Vastanomys.[7][8][9][8] Additionally, he has worked on many other fossil vertebrates such as sharks, bony fishes, frogs, snakes, lizards, insectivores, rodents, etc.[10][11][12] He has also been involved in studies of latest Cretaceous-Paleocene faunas of the Deccan volcanic province of India and their implications in understanding the northward drift of the Indian tectonic plate.[13]
In 2023, Bajpai and colleagues reported on Tharosaurus indicus, India's first dicraeosaurid dinosaur, from the Thar Desert of Jaisalmer, Rajasthan state, western India. The fossils were unearthed from Middle Jurassic outcrops of the Jaisalmer Formation. The taxon likely represents the oldest known record of this group and, seen in conjunction with previously known early Jurassic sauropods from India (Barapasaurus, Kotasaurus), suggests that what is now India may have been a major centre for neosauropod evolution.[14]
^"Sunil Bajpai". www.iitr.ac.in. Retrieved 19 October 2023.
^"Welcome to BSIP". www.bsip.res.in. Retrieved 22 September 2022.
^ abThewissen, J. G. M.; Cooper, Lisa Noelle; George, John C.; Bajpai, Sunil (2009). "From Land to Water: the Origin of Whales, Dolphins, and Porpoises". Evolution: Education and Outreach. 2 (2): 272–288. doi:10.1007/s12052-009-0135-2. ISSN 1936-6426. S2CID 11583496.
^ abThewissen, J. G. M.; Cooper, Lisa Noelle; Clementz, Mark T.; Bajpai, Sunil; Tiwari, B. N. (2007). "Whales originated from aquatic artiodactyls in the Eocene epoch of India". Nature. 450 (7173): 1190–1194. Bibcode:2007Natur.450.1190T. doi:10.1038/nature06343. ISSN 0028-0836. PMID 18097400. S2CID 4416444.
^Bajpai, S.; Thewissen, J. G. M.; Sahni, A. (2009). "The origin and early evolution of whales: macroevolution documented on the Indian Subcontinent". Journal of Biosciences. 34 (5): 673–686. doi:10.1007/s12038-009-0060-0. ISSN 0250-5991. PMID 20009264. S2CID 28232300.
^Bajpai, Sunil; Thewissen, J. G. M.; Kapur, Vivesh Vir; Tiwari, B. N.; Sahni, Ashok (2006). "Eocene and Oligocene sirenians (Mammalia) from Kachchh, India". Journal of Vertebrate Paleontology. 26 (2): 400–410. doi:10.1671/0272-4634(2006)26[400:eaosmf]2.0.co;2. ISSN 0272-4634. S2CID 86682899.
^Bajpai, Sunil; Kay, Richard F.; Williams, Blythe A.; Das, Debasis P.; Kapur, Vivesh V.; Tiwari, B. N. (2008). "The oldest Asian record of Anthropoidea". Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. 105 (32): 11093–11098. Bibcode:2008PNAS..10511093B. doi:10.1073/pnas.0804159105. ISSN 0027-8424. PMC 2516236. PMID 18685095.
^ abBajpai, Sunil; Kapur, Vivesh V.; Thewissen, J. G. M.; Das, Debasis P.; Tiwari, B. N.; Sharma, Ritu; Saravanan, N. (2005). "Early eocene primates from Vastan lignite mine, Gujarat, western India". Journal of the Palaeontological Society of India. 50 (2): 43–45. ISSN 0552-9360.
^Bajpai, Sunil; Kapur, Vivesh V; Das, Debasis P; Tiwari, B N; N, Saravanan; Sharma, Ritu (2005). "Early Eocene land mammals from the Vastan Lignite Mine, District Surat (Gujarat), western India". Journal of the Palaeontological Society of India. 50 (1): 101–113.
^Carolin, Nora; Bajpai, Sunil; Maurya, Abhayanand Singh; Schwarzhans, Werner (2022). "New perspectives on late Tethyan Neogene biodiversity development of fishes based on Miocene (~ 17 Ma) otoliths from southwestern India". PalZ. 97: 43–80. doi:10.1007/s12542-022-00623-9. ISSN 0031-0220. S2CID 249184395.
^Das, Debasis P.; Carolin, Nora; Bajpai, Sunil (2022). "A nyctitheriid insectivore (Eulipotyphla, Mammalia) of Asian affinity from the early Eocene of India". Historical Biology. 34 (7): 1157–1165. Bibcode:2022HBio...34.1157D. doi:10.1080/08912963.2021.1966002. ISSN 0891-2963. S2CID 238735010.
^Kumar, Krishna; Bajpai, Sunil; Pandey, Pragya; Ghosh, Triparna; Bhattacharya, Debasish (2022). "Hybodont sharks from the Jurassic of Jaisalmer, western India". Historical Biology. 34 (6): 953–963. Bibcode:2022HBio...34..953K. doi:10.1080/08912963.2021.1954920. ISSN 0891-2963. S2CID 238781606.
^Chatterjee, Sankar; Scotese, Christopher R; Bajpai, Sunil (2017). The Restless Indian Plate and Its Epic Voyage from Gondwana to Asia: Its Tectonic, Paleoclimatic, and Paleobiogeographic Evolution. Geological Society of America. doi:10.1130/spe529. ISBN 978-0-8137-2529-1.
^Bajpai, Sunil; Datta, Debajit; Pandey, Pragya; Ghosh, Triparna; Kumar, Krishna; Bhattacharya, Debasish (4 August 2023). "Fossils of the oldest diplodocoid dinosaur suggest India was a major centre for neosauropod radiation". Scientific Reports. 13 (1): 12680. Bibcode:2023NatSR..1312680B. doi:10.1038/s41598-023-39759-2. ISSN 2045-2322. PMC 10403599. PMID 37542094.
SunilBajpai is the Chair Professor of Vertebrate Paleontology in the Department of Earth Sciences, Indian Institute of Technology Roorkee. He is in service...
Manoj Bajpayee (born 23 April 1969), also transliterated as Manoj Bajpai, is an Indian actor who predominantly works in Hindi cinema and has also done...
of the Age of Mammals. Johns Hopkins University Press. pp. 242–267. SunilBajpai; Vivesh Kapur; Debasis P. Das; BN Tiwari; N. Saravanan; Ritu Sharma (2005)...
Science 148(3667):220-227 Sankar Chatterjee, Christopher R. Scotese, SunilBajpai (2017) "Indian Plate and Its Epic Voyage from Gondwana to Asia: Its Tectonic...
directed by Madhura Sreedhar Reddy. The film stars Mahat Raghavendra, Piaa Bajpai and Archana Kavi. BBS was produced by M. V. K. Reddy under the Shirdi Sai...
largely isolated from Asia. Largest prehistoric animals Datta, Debajit; Bajpai, Sunil (18 April 2024). "Largest known madtsoiid snake from warm Eocene period...
was isolated from other landmasses, and had a unique island biota. Bajpai, Sunil; Rautela, Abhay; Yadav, Ravi; Wilson Mantilla, Gregory P. (2024-02-29)...
445–453. doi:10.2478/if-2017-0022. S2CID 91838328. Ansuya Bhandari; SunilBajpai; Lawrence J. Flynn; B N Tiwari; Nivedita Mandal (2021). "First Miocene...
Africana 35, 1999. S. 85–110. Jean-Claude Rage, Guntupalli V.R. Prasad, SunilBajpai: Additional Snakes from the Uppermost Cretaceous (Maastrichtian) of India...
Vijayalakshmi, written by Uday Mahesh and starring Tovino Thomas and Piaa Bajpai. The film was produced by Yoodlee Films, a subsidiary production company...
stars Santosh Samrat, Chaitanya Krishna, Dipa Shah, Piaa Bajpai, and the music is composed by Sunil Kashyap. The film is a tale of two young pairs of lovers;...
described in 2014 resulted in the species being allocated to its own genus. SunilBajpai; J.G.M. Thewissen (2014). "Protocetid cetaceans (Mammalia) from the Eocene...
Danny Denzongpa (5) 0 : Naseeruddin Shah (4) 0 : John Abraham (2) 0 : Manoj Bajpai (2) 0 : Milind Gunaji (2) 0 : Ashish Vidyarthi (2) In the list below, the...
Topics in Paleobiology) (1st ed.). Wiley-Blackwell. ISBN 978-1118561270. Bajpai, Sunil; Thewissen, J. G. M. (2000). "A new, diminutive Eocene whale from Kachchh...
Manoj Bajpayee (born 23 April 1969), also credited as Manoj Bajpai, is an Indian actor who predominantly works in Hindi and has also appeared in Telugu...
included, its grouping in the same family is questionable. Datta, Debajit; Bajpai, Sunil (2024-04-18). "Largest known madtsoiid snake from warm Eocene period...
Retrieved June 2013. Wikispecies has information related to Himalayacetus. Bajpai, Sunil; Gingerich, Philip D (December 1998). "A new Eocene archaeocete (Mammalia...
unearthed. It was the first such whale to be seen by a human, ever." SunilBajpai and Thewissen collected fossils in District Kutch, State of Gujarat,...
and Why it Matters Richard Dawkins (2009). The Greatest Show on Earth SunilBajpai; J.G.M. Thewissen (2014). "Protocetid cetaceans (Mammalia) from the Eocene...
Shivdasani. Chandraprakash Dwivedi cast her alongside Urmila Matondkar and Manoj Bajpai in the critically acclaimed Pinjar which went on to win the National Film...
onwards) Shilpa Shinde as Mary Demello (season 2) Vineet Raina as Bajrang Bajpai/Lakhan (season 2) Ashutosh Sinha as Guddu Firoz Ali as Thakursaab The show...
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