PRI's labs, research collection, library, and archive collections serve as important research facilities for our scientists and affiliated students. These facilities greatly improve PRI's ability to carry out original research and research training, and to qualify for research funding from agencies such as the National Science Foundation, both of which are critical to PRI's mission of cutting-edge science in the fields of paleontology and evolutionary biology.
Bio Lab
Bio Lab is a “clean lab” for microscope work, including dissection, microfossil processing, scanning electron microscopy, and histology. It is PRI’s primary location for sensitive equipment and chemical procedures.
Features: microscopes; fume hood; scanning electron microscope (SEM) and peripherals (sputter coater and critical point dryer); refrigerator; freezer; acid and flammable chemical storage; chemical supplies.
Special thanks to 2011 Bio Lab donors David Meyer, Jean McPheeters, Phil Bartels, and Cornell University’s NanoBiotechnology Laboratory.
Paleo Lab
Paleo Lab is a “dirty lab” for processing field collections of rocks and fossils as well as rough specimen preparation, separate from the delicate instrumentation in Bio Lab and Prep Lab.
Features: rock saw; sieving sink; drying cabinet.
Special thanks to 2011 Bio Lab donors Mike Ward and Phil Bartels.
Wet Lab
Wet Lab is an “aquarium room” for the maintenance of living aquatic animals and plants. Although one might not expect a paleontological institution to need to work on living animals, scientists at PRI often do so to compare results to the fossil record.
Features: marine and freshwater aquaria.
Special thanks to 2011 Bio Lab donors Jim Morin, Richard Kissel, and LeChase Construction.
Prep Lab
Prep Lab represents a complete renovation of the Museum of the Earth’s Preparation Laboratory, originally built in 2003. Prep Lab is both a research space and a public exhibition; PRI staff, graduate students, and trained volunteers conduct fine specimen preparation in view of the visiting public. Viewing windows allow visitors to talk with experts in the lab, and a monitor outside the lab features images from a microscope camera, providing visitors with an inside view of the process. From the massive bones of dinosaurs to the delicate skeletons of trilobites, a wide variety of scientific specimens are prepared within Prep Lab for study and/or display. In addition to specimens from PRI, Prep Lab is also preparing loaned material from the Carnegie Museum of Natural History, American Museum of Natural History, and other world-renowned institutions.
Features: stereo/photomicroscope; microblaster; pin vises; adhesives, consolidants, and sculpting material; fume hood.
Special thanks to 2010-2011 Prep Lab donors H. Allen Curran, Shirley Egan, Laura Gattoni, Jim Morin, Jennifer Liber Raines, Nancy Ridenour, Myra Shulman, Don Wilson, and Anonymous.
AAR Lab
The Amino Acid Racemization (AAR) geochronology lab at the Paleontological Research Institution (PRI) was created in 2015 after all the necessary equipment for the lab was acquired from the University of Delaware late in 2014. This transfer occurred because of the retirement from Delaware’s Geological Sciences Department of Professor (now PRI research associate) John Wehmiller, one of the world’s leading experts in the field of AAR dating and its applications to Quaternary geochronology.
The AAR Lab at PRI consists of all the necessary wet chemical and sample preparatory equipment for AAR dating analysis, using an Agilent 6890 Gas Chromatograph (GC) equipped with Chemstation software for operation of the autosampler system and data storage. The AAR Lab at PRI is one of approximately six worldwide (two others in the US) and the only one employing GC methods.
Research Collection, Library, and Archives
In addition to the research laboratories noted above, PRI also has a world-class paleontological research collection that includes some 7 million specimens, a library with over 60,000 books and serials, and the Gertrude Wolfner PRI Archives, which includes the papers and other media of a number of prominent paleontologists.