New Zealand Scientists Bring Extinct Birds Back Through 3D Scanning

by Clare Scott | Dec 2, 2015 | 

The extinction of a species is a heartbreaking thought, especially when you consider that some of our most beloved species, like monarch butterflies, frogs and toads, and bats are threatened, by disease or climate change, to the point that they may not be around for our grandchildren to see. Someday, they may only exist in museums, as remote to humans as moa and adzebills.

Say what now? Yes, moa and adzebills existed once, but the flightless birds have been extinct for thousands of years. You may never have heard of them (I certainly hadn’t) but a collaboration between scientists at Massey University, the Auckland War Memorial Museum and the Museum of New Zealand Te Papa Tongarewa is bringing them back to life. Okay, not literally bringing them back to life – stop your Jurassic Park fantasies – but thanks to 3D scanning, the birds, along with several other of New Zealand’s extinct bird species, are being made more real than they have been for a long time.

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