Monday, May 14 11:28 am
Science Bulletins is a production of the National Center for Science Literacy, Education, and Technology (NCSLET), part of the Department of Education at the Museum. Click here to learn more.
10:07 am
In rural coal mining communities in China, miners face daily perils for slim rewards in a profession that claims an estimated 5,000 lives annually. Winner of the 2011 Margaret Mead Filmmaker Award Yuanchen Liu delved into this riveting story with his documentary To the Light, and as part of the Margaret Mead Traveling Film Festival, the film and Liu will return to the Museum on Thursday, May 17, at 6:30 pm for a special encore screening and discussion.
To the Light has traveled to St. Thomas and Vietnam since the 2011 Margaret Mead Film Festival. The 2012 Margaret Mead Film Festival will take place at the Museum from November 29 through December 2.
Thumbnail: The 2011 Margaret Mead Filmmaker Award jury was led by Darren Aronofsky, the Academy Award-nominated director of Black Swan and The Wrestler, who poses for a photo with Yuanchen Liu.
Wednesday, May 02 4:17 pm
Museum President Ellen V. Futter recently spoke about the Museum’s digital initiatives on the talk show “Digital Age,” hosted by Jim Zirin. Watch the full interview below.
10:09 am
Call it the ultimate space camp: for one week this summer, a group of middle school students will learn how to use the Museum’s Digital Universe Atlas, a three-dimensional, scientifically accurate map of the cosmos, and discover how the atlas is built from data gathered by scientists around the world. Then, using gaming laptops, the students will create their very own digital tour to a favorite spot of the universe, which will be shown in a special evening program in the Hayden Planetarium Space Theater on Friday, July 13.
Digital Universe Flight School is open to students entering grades 6, 7, 8, or 9 this fall. For more information about the course, which runs from Monday, July 9, through Friday, July 13, click here.
Tuesday, May 01 11:01 am
Tyrannosaurus rex is part of the carnivorous groups of dinosaurs that, according to new research, maintained a stable level of biodiversity leading up to the mass extinction at the end of the Cretaceous. © AMNH/J. Brougham
Were dinosaurs already undergoing a long-term decline before an asteroid hit at the end of the Cretaceous about 65.5 million years ago? A new study led by Museum scientists gives a multifaceted answer.
The findings, published online today in the journal Nature Communications, suggest that in general, large-bodied, “bulk-feeding” herbivores were declining during the last 12 million years of the Cretaceous Period. But carnivorous dinosaurs and mid-sized herbivores were not.
“Few issues in the history of paleontology have fueled as much research and popular fascination as the extinction of non-avian dinosaurs,” said lead author Steve Brusatte, a Columbia University graduate student affiliated with the Museum’s Division of Paleontology. “Did sudden volcanic eruptions or an asteroid impact strike down dinosaurs during their prime? We found that it was probably much more complex than that, and maybe not the sudden catastrophe that is often portrayed.”
The research team, which includes Brusatte; Mark Norell, chair of the Museum’s Division of Paleontology; and scientists Richard Butler of Ludwig Maximilian University of Munich and Albert Prieto-Márquez from the Bavarian State Collection for Palaeontology, both in Germany, is the first to look at dinosaur extinction based on “morphological disparity”—the variability of body structure within particular groups of dinosaurs. Read more »
