Scientific curator and palaeontologist from the New Mexico Museum of Natural History (USA) visits the Museum für Naturkunde Chemnitz
Press invitation: 5 August, 2.30 pm, Museum für Naturkunde
On Monday 5 August at 2.30 pm, the scientific curator and palaeontologist of the New Mexico Museum of Natural History and Science, Dr Spencer G. Lucas, will visit the Museum für Naturkunde Chemnitz together with Prof. em. Jörg W. Schneider from the Technische Universität Bergakademie Freiberg to gain an insight into the concepts for the future permanent exhibition.
Representatives of the media are invited to this event on 5 August at 2.30 pm at the Museum für Naturkunde.
"Seeing the world-famous fossil deposit of fossilised plants from the Permian period here in Chemnitz is both an obligation and a pleasure for me," says Dr Lucas. The focus is on the current scientific findings from the excavations in the centre of the city of Chemnitz as well as the design planning for the future permanent exhibition. "How would the experienced curator Dr Lucas tell our Chemnitz story?" asks Dr Thorid Zierold, curator of the future permanent exhibition.
Background on the people
Dr Spencer G. Lucas, Senior Curator of Palaeontology at the New Mexico Museum of Natural History and Science: His studies of mammals from around 60 million years ago have contributed significantly to our understanding of taxonomy, developmental biology and biostratigraphy.
In addition, he has worked intensively on a worldwide time correlation based on tetrapod evolution. Among other things, he created a tetrapod-based time scale for the Permian. This is precisely where his interests coincide with those of the Museum für Naturkunde - Lucas supports the scientific processing and interpretation of the numerous animal fossils from the ongoing excavations. As a curator at the New Mexico Museum of Natural History and Science, Dr Lucas has actively worked to expand and research the fossil record, publishing nearly 1,300 articles. The collection he oversees comprises 70,000 items. These include the world's largest and most significant evidence of surviving tracks in rock. Lucas also works on science communication and curated the dinosaur exhibitions "Dawn of the Dinosaurs: Triassic New Mexico", "Jurassic: Age of Super Giants" and "Cretaceous: New Mexico's Seacoast."
Prof Jörg W. Schneider is Professor Emeritus of Palaeontology at the world's oldest mining university, TU Bergakademie Freiberg. He stands for international exchange, science communication and networking like no other. It is particularly important to him that basic research and organismic palaeontology open up fields of application in geoscientific practice. He saw it as his task to train a flexible geoscientist equipped with solid geological and scientific foundations as well as practical professional skills at a sophisticated, modern level. The breadth of expertise and the successful development of a sought-after, strongly applied branch of palaeontology/stratigraphy remain a key feature of the Freiberg School to this day. Since 1992, J. Schneider has succeeded in acquiring more than 25 research projects from the DFG, the DAAD, the Humboldt Foundation and international research funding organisations. He has published over 200 articles and co-edited several books. Since 2015, he has also been a professor at Kazan Federal University, where he initiated a Master's double degree programme between Freiberg and Kazan.