New Styxosaurus exhibit unveiled at southern Manitoba museum

The Canadian Fossil Discovery Centre in Morden unveiled its new Styxosaurus exhibit on Friday, showing off large reconstructions of the long-neck plesiosaur that once swam tens of millions of years ago during the Cretaceous period.

Adolfo Cuetara, the museum's executive director, said the specimen at the centre of the new exhibit was unearthed during mining work at North Cox farm near Miami, Man., back in 1983.

The original bones — on display in a glass case — were used to reconstruct the full skeleton using 3D technology. It took months to print out more than 400 bones and put it all together, he said.

"It's not the first time that we used 3D printing to reconstruct, but this is the first time that we used it for a whole complete skeleton," Cuetara said, adding artificial intelligence was also used to create a separate life-like sculpture of the dinosaur.