Peter Douglas Ward se narodil v roce 1949. Jeho rodiče, Joseph and Ruth Ward,se přestěhovali do Seattlu po 2.sv. válce.Absolvoval Franklin High School. Wardova akademická kariera započala na Ohio State University, dále na NASA Astrobiology Institute, na University of California, McMaster University , a na California Institute of Technology. V roce 1984 byl zvolen členem California Academy of Sciences. Peter Ward se specializuje na období velkého vymírání. Publikuje knihy o biodiversitě a fosilních pozůstatcích. Ward také vyučuje jako mladší profesor zoologie a astronomie. Ward spolupracuje s astronomem Donaldem Brownleem , jako např. na bestseleru Rare Earth: Why Complex Life Is Uncommon in the Universe,publikovaného v roce 2000. Dílo: In Search of Nautilus: Three Centuries of Scientific Adventures in the Deep Pacific to Capture a Prehistoric, Living Fossil ISBN 978-0671619510 OCLC 17840660 On Methuselah's Trail: Living Fossils and the Great Extinctions ISBN 978-0716724889 The Call of Distant Mammoths: Why the Ice Age Mammals Disappeared ISBN 978-0387985725 Time Machines: Scientific Exploration of Deep Time ISBN 978-0387984162 Rivers in Time: the Search for Clues to Earth's Mass Extinctions ISBN 978-0231118620 Rare Earth: Why Complex Life Is Uncommon in the Universe with Donald Brownlee ISBN 9780387952895 Future Evolution: An Illuminated History of Life to Come ISBN 978-0716734963 The Life and Death of Planet Earth: How the New Science of Astrobiology Charts the Ultimate Fate of Our World with Donald Brownlee ISBN 978-0805075120 Gorgon: Obsession, Paleontology, and the Greatest Catastrophe in Earth's History ISBN 978-0670030941 Life as We Do Not Know It: The NASA Search for Alien Life ISBN 0-670-03458-4 Out of Thin Air: Dinosaurs, Birds, and Earth's Ancient Atmosphere ISBN 0-309-10061-5 Under a Green Sky: Global Warming, the Mass Extin...