Duplicating the Fossils of Human Evolution at Penn

Published: March 30, 2012, 7:26 p.m.

Discovering a multi-million year old human fossil may represent a truly one-of-a-kind look into the history of the human species, but even the most well preserved specimen is not much use in a vacuum. Fossils must be compared to each other to give scientists insight into where they fit in the long progression to humans of today, and here, the rarity of such finds are a real obstacle. Janet Monge has a solution. As the associate director and manager of the Casting Program at the University of Pennsylvania Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology, she and her volunteer assistants make replicas of these priceless fossils that are identical at up to 4,000 times magnification.