Fossil preparation requires an uncommon degree of adaptability and patience. Museum preparators bring to the task diverse sets of skills from such backgrounds as art, paleontology, and archaeology. They generally learn their craft on the job, drawing from related fields such as object conservation to adapt modern glues, solvents, and other archival materials to stabilize fragile areas or repair damage.
Watch as Justy Alicea, a preparator at the American Museum of Natural History, works on a specimen and offers a tour of the Museum’s fossil preparation lab. For more, read this article about fossil preparation, which originally appeared in the Summer 2010 issue of Rotunda, the Members’ magazine.