Is there a future for artificial reefs?
Manmade structures such as seawalls, breakwaters, and jetties are increasing in frequency in marine coastal environments. Overtime, these structures are unintentionally recruiting marine life such as corals, resulting in the formation of artificial reefs…
Naturalis and Picturae will digitize thousands of insects
This summer visitors to Naturalis can see something unique in the museum: a giant installation that will photograph tiny insects in detail. The system has been developed by the Dutch company Picturae , which provides solutions to solutions to digitize…
Biodiversity devastation: human-driven decline requires millions of years of recovery
A new study shows that the current rate of biodiversity decline in freshwater ecosystems outcompetes that at the end-Cretaceous extinction that killed the dinosaurs: damage now being done in decades to centuries may take millions of years to undo.
Naturalis best museum of Europe 2021
We are so proud! Naturalis Biodiversity Center has been named European Museum of the Year on May 6, during an online ‘award ceremony’. This is the oldest and most prestigious museum award in Europe. Previous winners have included the Victoria and Albert…
Naturalis proud winner of the European Museum of the Year Award 2021
Naturalis Biodiversity Center has been named European Museum of the Year! The European Museum of the Year Award is the oldest and most prestigious museum award in Europe. On Thursday afternoon, during the online 'Award Ceremony', the joyful news was…
Jorinde Nuytinck appointed guest professor
Mycologist Jorinde Nuytinck has been appointed guest professor at Ghent University. “As a kid, I was already interested in plants and animals. My interest in that other kingdom of biology, the fungi, only came when I was studying biology in Ghent. They…
Walk the dinosaur! New biomechanical model shows T. rex in a swinging gait
Researchers from the Netherlands have created a new approach to envision how dinosaurs walked. By modeling a T. rex tail as a suspension bridge, the scientists formed a new idea of the animal’s walking speed. Trix, the tyrannosaur from Naturalis museum in…
The day of the PhD defence: F. Andrés Rivera-Quiroz
Today at 11:15, Andres Rivera-Quiroz will enter the Academy Building to defend his thesis entitled "Integrative taxonomy of araneomorph spiders: Breathing new life into an old science". For his PhD research at Naturalis and Leiden University, he immersed…
Naturalis sends a 3D printed Tyrannosaurus to Japan
Leiden, 12 april 2021. The 3D printed Tyrannosaurus rex that was in the central hall of Naturalis Biodiversity Center in the Netherlands, is being shipped to Japan. The life-sized replica of Naturalis iconic dinosaur Trix will leave for the Dinosaur Museum…