Famed Harvard University palaeontologist Stephen Jay Gould - who nailed down the natural history of the presumed extinct Bermuda Land Snail genus - has died at his home in New York after a long battle with cancer.

The 60-year-old unlocked the mysteries of evolution for millions of readers with essays on the panda's extra thumb and helped bring natural history museums to popular audiences.

The New York City native arrived in Bermuda in the 1959 as a geology major looking for a doctoral thesis, only to stumble on the tale of poecilozonites.

Gould showed that up to 15 species evolved from just one stray snail from the North American continent, in a celebrated example of species radiation.

He worked at the Bermuda Biological Station for Research and during several visits throughout the 1960s and 1970s saw the decline of the snails due to predation by imported snails and development.

During those years, Gould worked closely with former Agriculture and Fisheries scientist Senator Walwyn Hughes, former Conservation officer David Wingate and with current head of the Bermuda Aquarium, Museum and Zoo, Wolfgang Sterrer.

In one of his books he thanked “a host of Bermudian children” who helped him dig fossil snail shells out of their back yards.

“Bermudians were very nice to me,” he told The Royal Gazette in 1999. “They would let me snoop around about their back yards. I don't think anyone told me no. I would go around on my rented Dowling's cycle all over the place. Good men like David Wingate and Walwyn Hughes could tell you all about the poecilozonites, they were in on it as well.”

Gould's “An Evolutionary Microcosm: Pleistocene and Recent History of the Land Snail Poecilozonites in Bermuda” recalls a different time, one where islanders remembered collecting the snails by the bucketful to be ground up and burnt for lime and mortar

Last night Sen. Hughes said of his friend: “He was a giant in the scientific world. He was productive in journals but a guy who could write for the general public. He was a disciple of Darwin, of course.

“He used poecilozonites as a model for evolutionary progress to confirm some of his theories, taking into consideration the influence of climate and habitat. It was like Darwin's finches (of Galapagos) all over again. Back then he was an ordinary personable guy riding a Mobylette.

“We did stay in touch. He was one of those persons who he always remembered you. I was abroad recently and saw his newest book, a really thick one bringing together all his ideas, but I put off buying it. Now I'll have to get it.”