Witmer's Lab Facilities

In April 2002, we will be moving into a brand-new, custom-designed building! Click here for a preview!

	General layout Witmer's lab and office complex in Grosvenor Hall occupies about 875 square feet, including the main lab, Witmer's office, and a grad student office. Specimen storage cabinets are located in an adjoining lobby. Witmer's lab connects internally with Audrone Biknevicius' lab, which greatly fosters the sharing of ideas (and, lamentably for our neighbors, smells).
	Equipment The lab is well outfitted with updated computers (multiple desktop and laptop PCs), dissecting microscopes (two Nikon scopes), compound light microscopes (Zeiss, American Optical), small bench pieces (balances, stirrers, heating plates, ultrasonicators, etc.), two four-panel radiograph view boxes, a fume hood, three freezers, specimen refrigerator, x-ray, air compressor, and a wide assortment of dissecting instruments. We even have a very active dermestid beetle colony for the fine preparation of skeletal specimens.
Resources The lab has extensive materials for the study of the amniote head anatomy and evolution. • Broad and rapidly growing collections of dried skull material of virtually all amniotes, with an emphasis on birds (ostrich, duck, goose, chicken, and other legally obtained species), crocodilians (alligator, caiman, salt water and New Guinea crocodile), squamates (monitors and iguanas), turtles, and large mammals (seals, bear, canids, bovids, moose, deer, horse, rhino, pigs & warthogs, camel, hippo, etc.). Growth series are available for chicken, duck, goose, alligator, and the crocodiles. • Complete and replicated cleared-and-stained growth series (up to hatching) of chicken, duck, albatross, and alligator. • The Julian J. Baumel Avian Spirit Collection: donated by Dr. Baumel, it is a large collection of preserved bird specimens, some of which are injected for vascular study. • Fluid specimens of alligator, salt water crocodile, and New Guinea crocodile, various ages. • Extensive collection of dinosaur skull casts, assembled over many years and representing most of the major clades of dinosaurs (see below amd here). • CT scan data of about 15 dinosaur skulls (e.g., Diplodocus, Stegosaurus, Pinacosaurus, Deinonychus, Edmontosaurus) and about 10 extant amniote heads (e.g., tapir, horse, manatee, moose, hooded seal, gharial) • 10,000 digital images of fossil archosaur skull material. Witmer has put all his slides and negatives of fossil archosaur specimens studied around the world on PhotoCD. • 50-60 hours of video of fossil archosaur skull material. Hi-8 format.
Skull Research Collection Although major collections are not too far away (Carnegie Museum: 3.5 hours; Smithsonian Institution and Field Museum: 7 hours), we have attempted to assemble an adequate research collection of both dinosaur skull casts and modern amniote specimens. Click here or on the dinosaur skull at right to go to a page with the dinosaur skull casts holdings in the Witmer lab. Click here or on the xxxx skull at right to go to a page with the modern skull holdings in the Witmer lab.