By CRISTINA JANNEY
Hays Post

The Sternberg Museum has opened its backroom to show the public the transformation of fossils from the field to something that can enter the museum’s collection.

A big part of this has been the opening of the newly renovated Dane G. Hansen Paleontology Center. In addition to new state-of-the-art equipment, the lab has windows through which museum visitors can see scientists working on fossils.

Christina Byrd, collections manager, is using the space to offer fossil identification at noon each Friday in July.

As there was no line waiting for Byrd’s services, I took my own “fossils” in for identification. I have been hunting crinoids with my dad in the gravel pits on my grandfather’s farm every since I can remember, so I dug into my box of rocks and fished out three promising specimens.

Two of my “fossils” weren’t fossils, Byrd said. They were just interesting rocks.

The one fossil was a mold of the inside of a clam. Byrd said although the shell of the clam was gone, sediment had likely deposited inside of the clam to form the mold.

Although I had not marked the fossil, based on the box I found it in, I think this came from the area below the Tuttle Creek Dam. Many fossils were found there after flooding washed away topsoil and rock in 1993.

Byrd said she enjoys the opportunity to interact with visitors thanks to new lab space.

“I think being able to interact with the scientist who is actually doing the work is so important,” she said. “I get stuck downstairs so often that I love the opportunity to come up and talk to everybody about the stuff I get to do everyday.”

The day I visited, she was working on a mosasaur skull. Mosasaurs were large aquatic reptiles that lived during the Cretaceous period from 100 million to 66 million years ago. They inhabited the inland see that covered Kansas at that time.

Byrd’s specimen on Friday was found in Gove County. Of the museum’s 21,000 catalog fossils, 14,000 of them were found in Kansas.

If you visit the lab, you can see the stages fossils move through as they are being prepared.

The fossil is first removed from the surrounding material and placed in a burlap and plaster cast for shipping. Once at the museum, the paleontologist has to remove the surrounding material.

My little clam fossil was pretty clean, probably because it was forcefully ripped out of the rock by a torrent of water. Not so for Byrd’s fossil. Her mosasaur skull was encased in a matrix.

The material surrounding the mosasaur skull was fairly soft, so Byrd was using dental tools to painstakingly clean the fossil. To add to the challenge, plant material had tried to grow into fossil.

Dinosaur fossils found in other areas of the U.S. can be located in much harder material. This can require pneumatic tools.

How long it takes to clean a fossil depends on its size and the material in which it was found. Some fossils can take years to prepare, Byrd said.

All of the paleontologists’ work is done under a microscope, but a monitor is mounted outside of the lab so visitors can see what the scientists are seeing.

“Because we do everything under a microscope, it is sometimes hard to see when someone is at the window because we are so focused. However, I can hear when they are interacting with that monitor,” Byrd said. “Because I hear a mom say, ‘Hey sweetie, see what she is working on there. You can actually see it up close there.’

“If I have the windows open I can say, ‘Hey, do you have any questions? Would you like to learn anymore about what is in here?’ Or kids will point and say, ‘What’s this?’ Having this larger window and broader space, people can see what is in here.”

All of the surrounding sediment materials cleaned from the fossils is saved. A specific researcher is using the material around the fossils to evaluate in what type of environment the animals lived.

“Once you have taken it all off, you have lost a specific detail of this bone’s history,” Byrd said. “It’s another clue. When you think about life, you have to think in the whole view. You can’t think in terms of just one animal. You have to think in the ecological view — the animals, the plants. What are the sediments telling us?

“Especially in the Western Interior Seaway since it was covered in water, the sediments can tell you a lot about what changes happened through time within those sediments. Did it get more course? Did it get finer? That can tell us different things about how water is moving throughout this area through that broad span of time that water covered the U.S.”

Microscopic creatures can be found in the sediment that also give clues to environment, such as temperature and salinity.

The original prep lab is now the histology lab. Scientists cut very thin slices of bone and grind them down to be viewed under a microscope.

Looking at the bone at the minute structural level can also gives clues about how the animals grew and what they ate. When reptiles experience a trauma, that can have arrested growth, which shows up in their bones.

Bone growth can also give researchers clues to the environment in which the animals lived, including water temperature and if the animal was warm- or cold-blooded.

One FSHU graduate student has been recently using histology to study the growth patterns of the Sternberg’s plesiosaur.

“You have all of these clues that confirm what scientists have been thinking of,” Byrd said. “It is just more evidence to support the case and give us a more solid understanding.

“We are taught to always question, but once you get enough information, we can say, ‘How much do we trust the current evidence? Test it again, see if we get the same results.’ If we continue to get the same results, then ‘OK that’s it.’ ”

You don’t have to have a fossil to visit the lab during the fossil ID ID time. You can just show up with questions. The event is free with admission.

If you have a question about a fossil and can’t make it on Fridays, check with the front desk or call the museum.