Six degrees of separation from palaeontologist Mark Norell

Mark Norell, chairman of palaeontology at the American Museum of Natural History, gave a talk on Thursday, hosted by the Royal Geographical Society of Hong Kong, on the evolutionary roots of birds in carnivorous dinosaurs. Norell – “the coolest dude alive”, according to The Wall Street Journal – was part of a team that announced in 1998 the discovery of two 120-million-year-old dinosaur species in northeastern China. At his New York museum, Norell has curated an exhibition titled “The World’s Largest Dinosaurs” as well as one about the Silk Road. One of the first Europeans associated with this trading route was Marco Polo …

The merchant, explorer and adventurer from Venice may not have given his name to the popular mint with a hole but he is credited with having introduced pasta to Italy. Almost 700 years after his death, though, scholars still cannot agree whether or not Polo travelled more in his mind than on his feet. In 2011, a team of Italian archaeologists argued that Polo never made it to China; a year later, a German historian claimed he did. No one knows for sure, then, but that didn’t stop Netflix making a series about Polo and his supposed exploits. Starring in that series, as the wife of the Mongolian emperor Kublai Khan, is Joan Chen …

Born in Shanghai in 1961, Chen grew up during what she calls “the worst of times” (the Cultural Revolution, of course) and was determined to join the navy or army until a casting director picked her out at school one day. She is best known as the spoiled royal wife in the film The Last Emperor, the seductive businesswoman in Twin Peaks and Mrs Yee in Lust, Caution. In 2008, Chen wrote an op-ed piece in The Washington Post criticising the politicisation of the Beijing Olympics. At the Games that year, one runner won three sprinting events in world record times: Usain Bolt …