Natural History Museum

Natural History Museum (NHM) in London is one of the world’s leading natural sciences institutions. The museum has a very large collection with over 80 million life and earth science specimens and welcomes a staggering 5 million visitors a year. An important part of the museums research is the imaging and analysis centre that contains a range of instruments that are used to support a wide variety of research within the museum. With the help of state-of-the-art micro-CT and nano-CT scanners in the lab the researchers can capture both the external and internal structure of objects in 3D.

Since 2013 the museum has been using the Inside Explorer Table on a regular basis to make a selection of scanned specimens available for the museum visitors. With Inside Explorer the visitors can interact and learn about recent scientific discoveries directly from the scanned samples. The scanned objects, including a gecko trapped in amber, the world famous ’Tissint’ meteorite and a mummified cat, can now be explored in full detail.

Demonstrating how our science is relevant to everyone in their daily lives is an important element of the Museum’s work and the ‘Table’ will offer a unique method for visitors to interact and learn about recent scientific discoveries directly from the scanned samples

– Chris Jones, Head of Imaging & Analysis Centre and Science Facilities at London’s Natural History Museum

The museum has currently two Inside Explorer Tables in use; one table is permanently installed in the Darwin Centre and one mobile system is used for ‘pop-up’ education activities around the Museum galleries, workshops and seminars.

Learn more at Natural History Museum.

Quick facts:

Location: Natural History Museum
Type: Permanent exhibition and Mobile Table
Installation: 2013 and 2014
Content: Scans provided by client
Hardware: 55” interactive table integrated in custom made housing, Mobile 55″ table
Services: Data processing, visualization, installation and support