Discoveries

Exhibitions

Deep Sea Challenger sub underwater and exploring

Pressure: James Cameron Into the Abyss

Explore the DEEPSEA CHALLENGER
Dec 12, 2022–Feb 20, 2023

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Scanning Electron Microscope Lab

See how big discoveries can come from the tiniest things in the Gem and Mineral Hall.

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Exhibition | NHM

Dinosaur Hall

Step Into Our Award-winning Exhibition, and Enter the Age of Dinosaurs

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Exhibition | LBTP

Fossil Lab

What happens after the fossils at La Brea Tar Pits are excavated? This is where you find out.

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Exhibition | LBTP

3D Theater

Travel back in time with Titans of the Ice Age.

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Events

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Children looking and pointing at specimens in clear cases inside the top of a gray cart

nhm

Adventures in Nature Day Camp: Science Sleuths

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weekly

through 08/08/25

12:00 am

Museum Educator wearing a headset with a microphone and holding a skull.

LBTP

Tours & Activities

Discoveries From the Tar Pits

Join a Museum Educator to hear about exciting discoveries from the Tar Pits! These are short presentations highlighting lesser known stories followed by a Q&A opportunity. Topics are always changing.

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daily

11:00 am
3:30 pm

11 am: Meet at the flagpole, just outside the Museum
3:30 pm: Meet outside the Fossil Lab inside the Museum

Museum Educator leading visitors along a path with big cat paw prints

LBTP

Tours & Activities Kids & Family Adults

Excavator Tour

The Excavator Tour explores the Fossil Lab where real paleontologists work, our historic excavation sites, and Project 23, where live excavations can be seen.

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daily

1:00 pm

nhm

Adventures in Nature Day Camp: Science Sleuths

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weekly

through 08/08/25

12:00 am

nhm

Tours & Activities

Scanning Electron Microscope Demonstration

Join an NHM scientist at the Scanning Electron Microscope Lab to learn how we use this important tool in discoveries about our natural world. Get an overview of this specialized equipment’s capabilities, see specimens in amazing detail, and have a chanc

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weekly

11:00 am

Tuesdays and Thursdays

Stories

A paradise tanager looks directly into a camera with its green head cocked, visible red spot on its back, and stunningly bright blue breast.

Hidden black and white feathers are the secret behind songbirds' dazzling colors

Colorful songbirds like tanagers use a painterly technique to make their colors pop

Vintage illustration of various feathers and specimen skins of birds

How Bird Feathers Work

A brief look at the structure of feathers—and what they mean to birds

A life-like painting of a large lizard lurking over a nest of dinosaur eggs with one already in its mouth

A Monster “Goblin” at the Feet of Dinosaurs

Meet the newly discovered giant, armored lizard named for the Hobbit’s goblin prince

An silhouette of a bird filled with naming words like 'black' 'western' etc

A First Step to Bird Names as Simple as ABC

First-of-its-kind Avian Lexicon Atlas maps how bird species get their names

Illustration of a long-legged crocodile-looking reptile looks at a mammal carcass on an ancient tropical islands

How Ancient Crocodile-Like Predators Ruled the Islands of the Caribbean

NHM's scientist discovers that sebicids, ancient land-dwelling crocodile-like beasts, reigned over the West Indies as apex predators after vanishing from South America

The lower jaw of a dire wolf from La Brea Tar PIts resting on a piece of paper with the words "Last known real dirw wolf in the world!!" Aenocyon dirus lower jaw 13,082 years old' written on it

Dire Wolves: Sorry, They’re Totally Still Extinct

NHM and Tar Pits experts weigh in on why dire wolves have not, in fact, been successfully cloned, and the surprising perils of de-extinction

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Scientists hiking a mountainous trail to a cave in the distance.

Gypsum Cave

News & Press

Eating bamboo? It's all in the wrist.

An ancient fossil reveals the earliest panda to survive solely on bamboo and the evolutionary history of panda's false thumbs

Earth’s First Giant

The two-meter skull of a humongous new ichthyosaur species, Earth’s first known giant creature, reveals how both the extinct marine reptiles and modern whales became giants on earth

Tooth Fast, Tooth Curious?

A new study uncovers a novel approach to a plant-based diet, unique to long-necked dinosaurs

A new study reveals saber-toothed cats suffered from hip dysplasia, an affliction common in pet cats and dogs, and points to supportive social structures for Smilodon.