Research

The Australian Opal Centre's collection of fossils and opal-related geological items is a rich resource for scientific researchers. AOC research partnerships are producing exciting results, especially in the fields of palaeontology (the science of fossils) and geology.

Discoveries from the AOC collection include:

• Lightning Claw, the huge megaraptorid carnivorous dinosaur from Lightning Ridge

• The first scientific record of pterosaur (flying reptile) fossils from NSW 

• The world's first scientific paper about an opalised ankylosaur dinosaur fossil

• Australia's oldest pulmonate snail (a land-living snail that breathes using a lung, not gills)

• The world's oldest horned turtle, or meiolaniid

• Weewarrasaurus, the first new species of dinosaur to be named in NSW since 1932!

• Fostoria, a new Australian species of herbivorous iguanodontian dinosaur

• For the first time in Australia, bones of a baby dinosaur that was still in its egg when it died

• New fossil crocodile species

• New information on the age of sediments in the Griman Creek Formation at Lightning Ridge

Australian Opal Centre collection items are being studied by scientists and research students at several institutions, including the University of New England at Armidale, NSW; the University of Queensland; Museum of Victoria; Swinburne University at Melbourne, Victoria; American Museum of Natural History; Jacksonville State University in Alabama; Natural History Museum, London; National Museum, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil; University of Bologna, Italy - and others. And the Australian Opal Centre itself.

You can support and be involved in scientific research at the Australian Opal Centre. Register for the annual Lightning Ridge Fossil Dig, donate items to the collection, or contact us to discuss a donation to the AOC acquisitions fund or if you think you can support our research in other ways.