In order to get a closer look at, and learn more about creatures that died long ago, like dinosaurs, researchers and historians have turned to 3D printing and 3D scanning methods many times. The technologies have even helped reveal the discovery of a new species, like in the recent case of a small dinosaur that’s been preserved as opal in white sandstone rocks for over 100 million years. This opalized fossil is pretty rare, and paleontologists are using a micro-CT scanner at Flinders University, Tonsley in Adelaide, Australia, along with 3D printing, to study and reconstruct the dinosaur inside, and perhaps even discover a new species while they’re at it.
Section through a bone of the new opalized dinosaur fossil showing the play of color of precious opal.
Photo: J. Brammall, Australian Opal Centre.
[Crazed opal would not hold together being prepped from matrix either.]
The rest of the article:
https://3dprint.com/294152/ct-scanning- ... ed-fossil/