Postdoc advert now live! Come and work with me at the UCL Centre for Integrative Anatomy @ucl-c4ia.bsky.social on the Mediterranean Neogene insular giant fauna. You'll also get to work with a great team: @toriherridge.bsky.social @nannonstevens.bsky.social and Jesse Hennekam
X-ray image of a chameleon in a plastic pint cup during CT scanning. Chameleon is facing downward and a clutch of eggs are visible in abdomen.
X-ray image (ventral view) of a chameleon specimen in a plastic pint cup. Chameleon is facing downward and eggs can be seen in abdomen.
Image of chameleon specimen in plastic pint cup (with acid-free tissue packed around it) in CT scanner. The curly tail is visible out of the top of the cup.
Anyone for a pint of chameleon?
Best way to stabilise our freeze-dried specimen for CT scanning. And what a surprise to see that she has eggs! @laurabporro.bsky.social
@ucl-c4ia.bsky.social
We are so pleased that World of Wasps has made the shortlist! A huge interdisciplinary team effort with @waspwoman.bsky.social @cintiaoi.bsky.social @idrisadams.bsky.social from @uclcber.bsky.social, Datascape Realities, @leaveylab.bsky.social @eloygl.bsky.social from @ucl-c4ia.bsky.social!
That's the Christmas presents sorted then
Are you an early career researcher (from undergrad student to finished PhD within 2 years) working on the history of natural history?
Submissions now open for the SHNH William T. Stearn Student Essay Prize 2026. Closing date is 31 July 2026.
shnh.org.uk/awards-honou...
Is it a bird? Is it a plane? Not quite. Image shows an elongate stuffed skin of a hyrax on perspex mount on table. The legs stretch out from the body in a pose reminiscent of Superman.
Image of museum display case with various specimens including the newly mounted hyrax study skin. A hyrax skull is in the foreground and a wombat model and skeleton is in the background. It appears that the wombats are riding on top of the hyrax but we can assure you they are not.
We have lift off! The new mount for our hyrax study skin not only elevates it for pest prevention but gives it the super hero pose appropriate for this unintentionally aerodynamic specimen.
Specimens in a display case at the Grant Museum of Zoology.
See this year's @ucl.ac.uk zoology student presentations and find out what they have discovered about their mystery museum specimens. Drop in between 2pm - 5pm on 5 December.
Maria Dragoi stood in the Micrarium at the Grant Museum of Zoology.
What’s missing from natural history collections? Maria Dragoi, @ucl.ac.uk Museum Studies alumna and current PhD candidate, discusses her research into our entomology collection and the importance of interpreting collections through a decolonial lens. www.ucl.ac.uk/museums-coll...
Join us tomorrow for a very special night @uclgrantmuseum.bsky.social as a part of @ucl.ac.uk MultiCOP supporting COP30. www.ucl.ac.uk/museums-coll...
My job is very glamorous
Hannah Cornish and Alice Holloway holding up a black drape behind UCL Grant Museum’s male gorilla skeleton ‘Hugo’ for some quick photos. They are smiling but their arms are screaming.
If you ever wondered how to photograph a gorilla skeleton without a studio …
African rock python skeleton articulated around a branch and temporarily suspended between coat racks. Which is the best use of coat racks ever.
Emilia Kingham holding branch with python skeleton before mounting in newly refurbished case. Alice Holloway crunching the numbers in distance.
Alice Holloway, Cyrus Shroff and Hannah Cornish ease python skeleton into case for positioning.
She’s up! Python skeleton hanging in case at UCL’s Grant Museum of Zoology.
So the answer to the question ‘how many people does it take to hang a python skeleton’ is five.
Taxidermy pink fairy armadillo specimen on black base with decanted Grant Museum specimens on tables in the background.
One of the benefits of decanting thousands of specimens for casework and redisplay is that you have the opportunity to deep dive into their histories and records. Just connected the archival dots of this pink fairy armadillo and it is an original @uclgrantmuseum.bsky.social specimen from 1828!
Tables packed full of animal specimen
An office with a lion skeleton on one of the desks and large jars of fish specimens on another
Tables packed full of animal specimens
Why is @uclgrantmuseum.bsky.social closed for two weeks? We are refitting some cases, so right now, it looks like this. Trust me, it's more organised than it appears! I'm enjoying sharing a desk with my lion skeleton coworker
Huge thanks to @tannisdavidson.bsky.social and team for making the impossible dream come true:
THE WORLD'S FIRST ART-SCIENCE WASP EXHIBITION!
www.ucl.ac.uk/museums-coll...
...from wasp researchers behind #WorldOfWasps @uclgrantmuseum.bsky.social...
@cintiaoi.bsky.social @idrisadams.bsky.social
A wasp nest on a curved brown leaf.
See the life of wasps as master architects, pest controllers and pollinators. Discover the delightfully relatable social goings-on inside our virtual nest at our upcoming exhibition from 25 June. www.ucl.ac.uk/museums-coll... #GMZWasps
Yes!
Everyone needs a jar of moles
I flipping love Operation Mincemeat! I cried twice. 11/10, would watch again.
A beige totebag with a black and white image of a jar full of moles on it. In the background is the Micrarium, a glowing alcove with walls made of microscope slides
It's finally here, the totebag to end all totebags from @uclgrantmuseum.bsky.social
Don't miss what is almost certainly the world's first museum exhibition all about wasps, opening on 25th June. The Grant Museum will be buzzing 🐝
Crabs in name only
Close up of four large brown horseshoe crabs in a glass jar. The fronts of their bodies are domed and horseshoe shaped with a serrated triangular back end and a long, pointed tail
What's on the @uclgrantmuseum.bsky.social trolley today?
Hannah Cornish stood at a lectern with her title slide behind her. It reads: "Making an exhibition of ourselves: displaying and not displaying human remains in the Grant Museum" and shows images of two museum displays
A PowerPoint slide reading "But then..." showing a comemrcially available plastic cast skull being unpacked from a cardboard box.
A lot of #museums are removing human remains from display if they don't have explicit consent from the person. They're often replaced with casts sourced commercially, but @hannahcornish.bsky.social at #NatSCA2025 pointed out that often these casts are made from remains that also don't have consent.
Three smiling people carry the ribcage of a large animal on the pavement outside the Grant Museum, while a fourth checks for traffic.
How do you move a 3 metre long, 150 year old dugong skeleton?
The @uclgrantmuseum.bsky.social dugong (known as Dougal or Derek to its friends) has been taken off display to be re-mounted by conservator Nigel Larkin. It will be back in the new year looking better than ever.
Animal specimens including skulls and jars
On the trolley today at the Grant Museum @uclgrantmuseum.bsky.social
Yes, I think it's still a font. I adapted it from an 1873 sampler to get the mid-Victorian vibes right
I love this! I recently finished a piece with 100,000 stitches, so clearly, I am to be feared!
When it comes to certain parts of anatomy, #museums have been deliberately teaching people the wrong thing.
Most #mammals have a bone in their penis but natural history museums usually remove them from display, as I told @iflscience.com (& wrote in #NaturesMemory):
www.iflscience.com/where-have-a...
And barnacles are harder to cross stitch