She works at Stony Brook University and is co-ordinator of Plio-Pleistocene research at the Turkana Basin Institute.

They found a 3.5-million-year-old skull and partial jaw thought to belong to a new branch of the early human family.

Her first contact with the Leakey family was working for the Tigoni Primate Research Centre while studying for her PhD.

[3][4] Leakey is currently a Research Professor for the Turkana Basin Institute (affiliated with Stony Brook University).

[5] On 30 April 2013, Leakey was elected as a Foreign Associate of the US National Academy of Sciences, with specialities of geology and anthropology.