On the College of Nebraska–Lincoln, a workforce contained in the Frontier Tech Lab has constructed one of the partaking examples of additive manufacturing (AM) in training proper now. Led by lab coordinator Isaac Regier, the workforce created a completely hands-on fossil dig expertise contained in the museum. Utilizing 3D printing, they reproduced actual fossils from the museum’s personal assortment, together with the encircling rock and sediment, so guests can dig up bones similar to paleontologists would. The work is a part of a broader renovation of the museum’s Paul D. and Betty Marx Discovery Heart, set to open in June, which is including extra hands-on actions targeted on “nature’s engineers.”
As an alternative of inserting uncommon, fragile fossils in a pit the place they might be broken, the workforce recreated them utilizing 3D printing, creating an area the place guests, particularly children, can dig, contact, and discover with out limits. And to this workforce, that’s the important thing concept, accessing these fascinating experiences. As a result of nothing drives curiosity in issues like historic fossils fairly like having the ability to really deal with them. It’s a change we’ve been seeing for a while in museums world wide, transferring past the “look however don’t contact” rule towards areas constructed for actual, hands-on discovery, or play, even.
Actual fossils are extremely delicate. Many are one-of-a-kind, and we’ve seen some so helpful they’ve offered for lots of of 1000’s, even hundreds of thousands of {dollars}. You don’t hand them to a six-year-old with a brush and say, “Go for it,” proper? However with 3D printing, you possibly can create correct replicas that feel and look actual, or actual sufficient, to show the identical classes, with out the chance of getting the fossil break.
The Frontier Tech Lab labored intently with museum scientists to provide lifelike fossil replicas and even whole fossil beds, turning what may have been a extra conventional exhibit into one thing hands-on and immersive. To recreate the fossil mattress, the workforce produced greater than 100 sensible fossilized bones. Many of those are based mostly on Menoceras, a rhino species from the Miocene period found at Agate Fossil Beds close to Harrison, Nebraska.
A museum constructed for discovery
This “expertise replication” meant the workforce didn’t simply scan a fossil from the gathering and hit “print.” In actual fact, they recreated your complete context: the way in which paleontologists discover fossils within the floor, the textures, even the association, so guests can perceive how these unimaginable, headline-making discoveries really occur.
And that’s as a result of in paleontology, the story isn’t simply concerning the fossil. It’s about the place it’s discovered, the way it’s uncovered, and what surrounds it. By printing these whole dig environments, not simply objects, the lab is utilizing 3D printing to inform a narrative. And it really works very well.
They’re utilizing a mixture of sensible fossil sorts tied to Nebraska’s paleontology, which is definitely fairly wealthy. That features historic mammals (Nebraska is well-known for Ice Age fossils like mammoths), smaller vertebrates, and normal fossil fragments that replicate what an actual dig web site seems to be like. So moderately than “digging up a full dinosaur,” guests are uncovering partial bones and items, which is far nearer to how actual paleontology works.
Isaac Regier, lead and design coordinator for the Frontier Tech Lab, units down one of many “bones” the lab 3D printed for a brand new fossil dig within the redesigned Marx Science Discovery Heart at Morrill Corridor.
The museum, a part of the College of Nebraska State Museum, has been round since 1871 and homes one of many largest vertebrate fossil collections in america. In actual fact, it’s identified for its huge shows, like its mammoth skeletons in Elephant Corridor, and for telling the story of life throughout hundreds of thousands of years.
However like many museums, it faces a typical problem, and that’s methods to make historic historical past really feel actual to somebody strolling in at present. And this 3D printed fossil dig adjustments that complete perspective. As an alternative of taking a look at bones behind glass, guests turn out to be a part of the method. They should kneel down, use brushes to take away the sediment, and discover one thing. Guests will discover this hands-on fossil dig expertise inside Morrill Corridor, as a kind of interactive station constructed proper into the museum flooring.
3D printed fossils.
The Frontier Tech Lab itself is a part of Nebraska Innovation Studio, a collaborative house the place engineers, designers, and researchers work with superior manufacturing instruments, together with 3D printers. Launched in October 2025, the lab operates as a full-service prototyping, design, and fabrication middle, working with campus items, municipalities, companies, and people.
The workforce needed to take actual scientific knowledge and switch it into one thing individuals can really use, robust sufficient to deal with, easy sufficient to grasp. That’s not straightforward. A fossil duplicate has to look actual, nevertheless it additionally has to carry up after being dug up again and again. That stage of accuracy required shut coordination with museum specialists, together with Susan Weller, who famous the complexity behind even the smallest particulars.
“They labored intently with our scientists to create the bones and guarantee they have been positioned within the right order and orientation,” Weller mentioned. “There are various tiny bones when you concentrate on the vertebrae or toe bones, and so they can get very complicated to these of us who don’t work with these bones. (Frontier Tech Lab employees) went above and past, and so they delivered all the things on time and on finances.”
On this case, 3D printing is enabling one thing totally different. It’s making the inaccessible accessible. And right here, meaning giving somebody, possibly a baby visiting for the primary time, the prospect to uncover a fossil and really feel, even for one single second, like they’re discovering the previous for themselves. It’s not only a higher exhibit, it’s a greater approach to be taught.
Pictures courtesy of the College of Nebraska–Lincoln
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