This week’s selection is the Dokdo Sea Lion Skeleton reconstruction by the Ministry of Oceans and Fisheries and the National Marine Biodiversity Institute of Korea.
This is a 3D-printed replica skeleton of the now-extinct Dokdo Sea Lion, a.k.a. Zalophus japonicus, the Japanese Sea Lion. The creature was first thought to be related to the California Sea Lion, but later it was determined that it was a completely separate species.
That didn’t seem to matter to early 20th-century commercial operations, which hunted the sea lion until it finally was declared extinct relatively recently, only in 1970.
Researchers used remaining bone samples as the source for the 3D model. They were able to 3D scan the samples and prepare 3D models of each bone, but some were missing. For these, they reverted to the California Sea Lion, which, as you might guess, is quite similar in bone structure.
They printed all 41 bones and then assembled the result, which is now on display at Seoul Station. Later, it will be transferred to the National Marine Biodiversity Institute of Korea for a subsequent exhibition.
The skeleton won’t bring back the extinct species, but passersby seeing the model may think twice about extinctions that are happening now.
Via Korea Times
