Jørn Harald Hurum

Jørn Harald Hurum (born November 4, 1967) is a Norwegian paleontologist. He is a vertebrate paleontologist and holds a førsteamanuensis position at the Geological museum of the University of Oslo. He has studied dinosaurs, primitive mammals and plesiosaurs.

Media
Hurum is known as a popularizer of science with a high media profile, author of the book Menneskets utvikling (the evolution of man) and as a TV host in the section Jørns hjørne (Jørn's corner) in the Norwegian popular science program "Newton", and in the radio program Hurum og Ødegaard (Hurum and Ødegaard), together with astrophysicist Knut Jørgen Røed Ødegaard). Hurum shared the University of Oslo's prestigious "formidlingspris" (award for popularization of science) in 2001 with Hans Arne Nakrem and Geir Søli.

Discoveries
Hurum has done work on theropod dinosaurs and on plesiosaurs from Svalbard. In 2006, his team uncovered an enormous short-necked plesiosaur, the largest predator known to ever have existed (see Predator X).

On May 19, 2009 he announced the acquisition and scientific description of a 47 million year old, 95% complete skeleton of a primitive primate, Darwinius masillae, that had been in the private possession of an amateur fossil collector for 25 years. Hurum named the specimen "Ida", after his daughter.