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Scientists CT scanned thousands of natural history specimens

Scientists CT scanned thousands of natural history specimens

March 7, 2024

The MCZ/Harvard University was one of around 10 scanning centers located across the U.S. (out of more than 20 collaborating institutions) for the six-year collaborative project to create 3D reconstructions of vertebrate specimens and make them freely available online.

Over the course of the entire project, we prepared more than 900 media files derived from more than 800 scans. Most of the specimens (amphibians, reptiles, fishes, mammals and birds) came from MCZ's collections, but nearly 200 specimens came from other institutions.

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Tomographic models of trilobites and euarthropods on a black background

Specimens acquired in the 1870's shed light on convergent evolution of defensive enrollment

January 2, 2024

They’d been in the collections of the Harvard Museum of Comparative Zoology (MCZ) since the 1870s when they were first discovered. Nestled in among the largest collection of trilobites, the unique fossils rested in drawers until 145 years later when Sarah Losso, PhD candidate in the Department of Organismic and Evolutionary Biology (OEB) at Harvard, began combing through the collection of trilobites as part of her dissertation.

“I started my PhD going through all of these thin sections of trilobites,...

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three students looking at a small shark specimen

Lauder Lab hosts Accessible Sharks program

August 25, 2023

George Lauder, MCZ Curator of Ichthyology, along with scientists from Yale University and the University of Florida, hosted three students studying sharks for eight weeks this summer through the Research Experience for Undergraduates program Accessible Sharks, funded by the National Science Foundation.

The program is geared to students with disabilities and researchers hope to expand the program next year. “I...

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