I recently wrote a small series about how geoscientists can
become more effective communicators of scientific knowledge to
the general public, and the pitfalls and issues associated with
this. The overall strategy revolved around using the right type
of language, along with a context and narrative to create
relevant stories, but above all this, to just go out there and
do it! That’s exactly what Imran Rahman has done, except he’s
gone a huge step further taken palaeontology and science
communication into the digital age! In a new paper, Imran, along
with two others, demonstrates the value of using ‘virtual
fossils’ as a tool for science communication, I guess
specifically to palaeontology, but there’s no reason why other
fields cannot adopt (or already have done) similar methods. The
use of digital palaeontology has been ongoing for quite a while
now within the scientific community, with virtual
reconstructions ranging from hadrosaur skulls using CT-scanning
(computed tomography – the same process they use to