Jack Tamisiea

Jack Tamisiea is a Science Communications Specialist at the Smithsonian's National Museum of Natural History. In addition to covering all things natural history for the museum's blog, Smithsonian Voices, he tracks media coverage and coordinates filming activities for the museum's Office of Communications and Public Affairs. Jack recently completed his masters in science writing at Johns Hopkins University and his writing has appeared in the New York Times, Scientific American, National Geographic and other science-focused publications. In his free time, he loves exploring the outdoors with a sketchbook and camera. You can read more of Jack's work at https://jacktamisiea.com.

Stories from this author

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The Buffalo is Life: Inside the Symbiotic Relationship Between Bison and Native Communities

The National Museum of Natural History worked with Indigenous experts to spotlight the enduring cultural significance of buffalo in the exhibition “Bison: Standing Strong”

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Here’s How the Smithsonian’s 70-Year-Old Bull Bison Got a Blow-Out

Conservators at the National Museum of Natural History recently spruced up a bison specimen for the new exhibition “Bison: Standing Strong”

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Meet the Entomologist and Wildlife Photographer Zooming in on the Weird and Wonderful World of Ants

Mark Moffett, a research associate at the National Museum of Natural History, specializes in capturing the often-overlooked behaviors of insects

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‘Snarge,’ Seashells and Much More This April at the National Museum of Natural History

This spring, the museum is hosting events exploring everything from how our ancestors wielded wooden tools to the work of forensic ornithologists

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Meet ‘Junior,’ the Giant Bison Skull That Crossed the Country to Star in New Exhibition at the National Museum of Natural History

The colossal cranium from Idaho recently received a touch-up to prepare for the Smithsonian spotlight

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How Did Animals Conquer the Deep Sea? Mussels and Clams Point to Two Different Strategies

New research shows why some shelly critters flourished in the ocean's harshest habitats — and others didn't

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To Get on the Same Frequency as Early Reptiles, this Scientist Compares Tiny Fossilized Bones to Modern Lizard Ears

Using the fossil record and modern cold-blooded critters, paleontologist Kelsey Jenkins recreates the hearing capabilities of ancient animals

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Scientists Discover New Species of Poison Dart Frog with One-of-One Specimen Collected More than Sixty Years Ago

If not for a pair of Smithsonian scientists, the fingernail-size frog from Brazil would have likely gone extinct without ever being described

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A New Pterosaur, Ancient Asteroid Brine and More Discoveries from the National Museum of Natural History in 2025

The year’s most notable findings also include insights into dog and sheep domestication and a new species of manta ray in the museum’s collection

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What Do You Get a Museum That Has Almost Everything for the Holidays? One of the Most Spectacular Dome-Headed Dinosaur Skulls Ever Unearthed

The National Museum of Natural History’s new Pachycephalosaurus skull sheds light on enigmatic group of dinosaurs and will be on display during the holiday season

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Meet the Museum Director Who’s Wild About Walruses

In celebration of World Walrus Day, National Museum of Natural History director Kirk Johnson talks about his new documentary on the saber-toothed seals

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To Survive Mass Extinctions, Reef-Building Corals Retreat to the Deep Blue Sea

Museum researchers reconstructed the evolutionary history of stony corals over the past 460 million years, providing insights into how the animals may fare in the future

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How Did the Ostrich Cross the Ocean? Its Ancestors Flew There

A remarkable fossil in the National Museum of Natural History’s collection reveals that the ancestors of modern flightless birds were capable of flying long distances

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New Research Reveals That the Asteroid Bennu Likely Originated on Outskirts of the Solar System

Smithsonian researchers analyzed fragments of the near-Earth asteroid and discovered water-rich clays that hint at a distant origin

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To Understand a Changing Estuary, Smithsonian Scientists Search for Biodiversity Buried in the Sediment

This past June, researchers congregated at the Smithsonian Marine Station to catalogue the vast diversity of tiny animals living in Florida’s Indian River Lagoon

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Paleontologists Discover a ‘Marvelous’ Triassic Reptile That Sported a Sail of Feather-Like Structures on its Back

The odd structure is distinct from anything seen in living animals and likely created a colorful display

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To Recreate a 17th-Century Masterwork, an Entomologist at the National Museum of Natural History Got Creative with Butterflies, Bees and a Bit of Rosemary

The display will be featured in a new exhibition at the National Gallery of Art as part of a historic collaboration along the National Mall

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To Correct Some Fishy Anatomy, Researchers at the National Museum of Natural History Get Inside the Head of a Coelacanth

The new work adds to the legacy of Dave Johnson, a long-time museum curator famed for his detail-oriented research on fishes

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How Do You Clean an 11-Ton Elephant? One Brushstroke at a Time

The National Museum of Natural History recently spruced up its iconic African elephant mount, which has greeted visitors since 1959

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15 Years Later, the National Museum of Natural History Is Still Asking What It Means to Be Human

The museum’s groundbreaking Hall of Human Origins centers around the adaptations that set early humans apart

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National Museum of Natural History Scientists Discover That Ancient Insects Perfected Their Plant Palates 165 Million Years Ago

The findings reveal that insects developed modern patterns of herbivory long before flowering plants flourished, upending a long-held hypothesis

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This February, Meet the Women Transforming Science at the National Museum of Natural History

Mark your calendar for the Mother Tongue Film Festival and events covering everything from odd oceanic couples to resilient deer

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Top Discoveries at the National Museum of Natural History in 2024

Fungus-farming ants, fossilized footprints and a prehistoric critter named after a Muppet are just a few of the year’s most notable findings

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To Understand How Species Evolve, Scientists Flock to Where Charismatic Birds Intermingle

For decades, researchers have explored a region in Panama that serves as a “manakin melting pot”

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Scientists at the National Museum of Natural History Discover Two Squirrel Species Long Obscured by Mistaken Identities

Using a variety of techniques, the researchers realized that two subspecies of squirrels from Southeast Asia were actually unique species in their own right

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Our Planet On the Big Screen: New Museum Exhibition Explores Ever-Changing Earth from Space and on the Ground

The Smithsonian partners with NASA to present the Earth Information Center, a larger-than-life display that visualizes interconnected changes on the planet

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Pawpaw-Palooza: The Inside Scoop on North America’s Taste of the Tropics

The strange plant is ingrained in American history and well-represented in the museum’s herbarium and gardens

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Fetching Fossils and Unwrapping Mannequins: Here’s What Happens When a Museum Exhibition Closes

In the wrap-up of “Objects of Wonder,” hundreds of the museum’s most treasured specimens are returning to the collection

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This Fall at the Museum: Fossils, Fossils and More Fossils!

There are also events about mushrooms, bats and much more at the National Museum of Natural History in September and October

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Check Out These Wondrous Objects on Display Before They Return to the Museum’s Collection

From whale earwax to a shimmering ammonite shell, the “Objects of Wonder” exhibition spotlights some of the museum’s most intriguing specimens

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Through the Fossil Grapevine: Museum Scientist Helps Untangle How the Fruit Thrived in the Aftermath of Extinction

The batch of newly-described fossils includes a species named after Smithsonian botanist Jun Wen

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Tiny Tornado Chasers: Why Rare Songbirds Rely on Destructive Winds

A new Smithsonian paper posits that Swainson’s warblers have tornadoes to thank for ideal habitats

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The ‘Ultimate Honor’: Why a Colorful Mineral Honors the Smithsonian‘s Namesake

Smithsonite honors the scientific legacy of mineralogist James Smithson

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Shrew Are You? Scientist Discovers Two New Species of Shrews in Museum’s Collection

Hailing from the mountains of Colombia, the new shrews fill in a geographical gap and are among a growing number of species discovered in collections

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Just Our Type: Museum's Dinosaur Skeleton Becomes the Scientific Standard for Its Species

In this month’s Specimen Spotlight, find out what makes the Smithsonian's Allosaurus specimen so special

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Interested in Using Museum Collections to Better Understand Freshwater Mussels? There’s Now an App for That

A new online resource combines data from 45 different natural history collections to provide easy-to-use information on America’s threatened freshwater mussels

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Celebrate Valentine’s Day With the Ocean’s Oddest Couples and More Natural History Programs This February

Join the National Museum of Natural History for programs on asteroid samples, fossils and chimpanzees

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NMNH in Review: Top Discoveries by Museum Scientists in 2023

Indigenous woolly dogs, ground sloth pendants and more headline-grabbing findings by scientists at the National Museum of Natural History

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1.1 Billion Objects and Counting: Inside the Effort to Tally Natural History Specimens Around the Globe

This year, NMNH director Kirk Johnson helped spearhead an effort to add up the collections of the world’s largest museums

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Meet the Archaeologist Leading the Museum’s Repatriation Efforts

With more than 20 years of experience at the Smithsonian, Dorothy Lippert is championing a collaborative approach to repatriation

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What a Drawerful of Dung Reveals About the Lives of Ground Sloths

For International Sloth Day, learn about the scientific clues preserved in petrified poop

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How Smithsonian Fossil Preparators Are Re-Excavating a Tyrannosaur From Its Past on Display

This National Fossil Day, take an inside look at the effort to free the skeleton for research after more than a century in museum fossil halls

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Summer Summary: A Mysterious Fossil Tooth, Metallic Planet and Marine Hitchhikers

Catch up on the museum discoveries you may have missed over the past few months

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For the Love of Lizards: Meet One of the Smithsonian’s Lizard Experts

For more than fifty years, museum herpetologist George Zug has studied all manner of reptiles and amphibians

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Smithsonian Expedition Yields a New Species of Deep-Sea Coral

Collected from the deep waters off Puerto Rico, the species is a member of an enigmatic, and threatened, group of corals

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Starstruck: A Suite of Strange Sea Stars Discovered in the Smithsonian’s Collection

Museum researcher describes several new species from specimens collected decades ago from Antarctica

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New Museum Display Showcases the Mineral Building Blocks of Cellphones

The story behind the specimens at the center of the museum’s new exhibition “Cellphone: Unseen Connections”

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“Endlessly Fascinating Devices”: Why the National Museum of Natural History is Exploring the Cultural Nature of Cellphones

A behind the scenes glimpse of the museum’s new exhibition, “Cellphone: Unseen Connections”

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Museum Collections Provide Some Muscle for Mussel Conservation

For Endangered Species Day, learn about the marvelous biology and murky future of freshwater mussels

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Discover How Domesticating Dogs Influenced Human Evolution and Other Natural History Programs This May

Participate in a Wikipedia Edit-a-thon and more this month at the National Museum of Natural History

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How Lugging a Liquid Nitrogen Tank into the Amazon Helped Spark Ornithology’s Genetic Revolution

Almost 40 years ago, Smithsonian zoologist Gary Graves collected tissue samples in the jungle that formed the nucleus of the museum’s DNA collection

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Dino-Sore: Smithsonian Paleontologist Diagnoses Ancient Ailments in the Museum’s Dinosaurs

For National Veterinary Day, Matthew Carrano gives several ancient reptiles a paleo-physical

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The Story Behind the Smithsonian’s Newest Gem: the Exquisite Lion of Merelani

The stunning tsavorite gemstone arrives at the museum with a well-documented history

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Smithsonian Scientists Discover One of the Earliest Mammal Ancestors That Ate Its Veggies

The new finding pushes the first signs of tetrapod herbivory back millions of years

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Peer Through the Glare to Glimpse the Night Sky in New Smithsonian Exhibition

‘Lights Out’ explores how ecology and culture revolve around the night and how light pollution is threatening this essential darkness

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A Bounty of Butterflies Arrives at the Smithsonian

Entomologist Floyd Shockley drove across the country to pick up a premier butterfly and moth collection

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Meet the Smithsonian Scientist Venturing to Volcanoes to Understand the Origins of Earth’s Surface

Elizabeth Cottrell collects rocks and analyzes samples in the lab to help reveal what makes Earth so unique

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In 1904, Theodore Roosevelt Won a Presidential Election…And a Pair of Ostriches

For President’s Day, learn the story behind the giant birds sent to Washington to celebrate Roosevelt’s reelection

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Smithsonian Scientists Unearth Signs of an Ancient Climate Calamity Buried Beneath the Seafloor

The research puts modern oceanic climate change in context

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2022 in Review: The Year’s Top Discoveries by Museum Researchers

An Ichthyosaur graveyard, oyster middens and other headline-grabbing findings by scientists at the National Museum of Natural History

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2022 in Review: Smithsonian Staff Sifts Through an Ocean of Fossils

Integrating shimmering ammonites, toothy mosasaurs and a massive haul of specimens into the growing National Fossil Collection

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2022 in Review: The National Herbarium Goes Digital

In May, the museum completed a groundbreaking digitization process that brought nearly four million pressed plants online.

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Meet the Smithsonian Director Bringing a Deep Time Perspective to the International Climate Discussion

Kirk Johnson highlights the vital climate context museum collections provide at international COP conferences

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How Leafcutter Ants and Other Culinary Creatures Prepare a Feast

Celebrate Thanksgiving with some of the animal kingdom’s greatest cooks, including marshmallow-roasting apes and salt-sprinkling monkeys

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This November, Be Thankful for Specialty Spirits and Ancient Sea Monsters

Tune into programs about “underground astronauts,” archetype-busting archaeologists and more with the National Museum of Natural History

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To Understand How Animals See in the Abyss, Scientists Peer Through the Eyes of an Alien Amphipod

The team utilized computer models to understand how a four-eyed crustacean sees in the deep ocean’s twilight zone

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Celebrate Fabulous Fossils and More Natural History Programs This October

Tune into programs about pioneering archaeologists, festive bat celebrations and more with the National Museum of Natural History

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Meet the Smithsonian Scientist Unlocking Crucial Conservation Clues in the Genetic Code of Koalas

For Save the Koala Day, learn how conservation geneticist Rebecca Johnson’s work helps protect these iconic marsupials

Elephant-like mammoth and mastodons trudge across a pond while a group of giant camels stop for a drink. In the background are snow-capped mountains. Crouching in the grassy foreground are a pair of sabertooth cats.

What the Demise of Mammoths Can Teach Us About Future Extinctions

Smithsonian scientist's research illustrates how North American ecosystems are still reeling from the megafaunal extinction that closed the ice ages

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To Uncover the Origins of Diseases, Smithsonian Researchers Dust Bat Specimens for Viral Fingerprints

Smithsonian scientists utilize a new formula to extract fragile genetic data from bats collected decades ago

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A Final Meal for the Ages

For World Mosquito Day, meet the “one in a million” fossil that proved fossilized blood is more than just science fiction

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Diving with Sharks Through Deep Time

Celebrate Shark Week by meeting some of the prehistoric sharks prowling the museum’s collection

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New Study Puts Smithsonian Conservation Efforts to the Test

The findings illustrate how people-focused initiatives benefit both society and nature

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New Smithsonian Exhibition Explores the Intersection of People and Nature

See the historic giant hornet ‘nest zero’ and explore how communities near and far interact with nature in ‘Our Places’

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Get To Know the Natural World’s Most Devoted Dads

Celebrate Father’s Day with pudgy penguins, karate-kicking frogs and other dependable animal dads

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Meet the Scientist Who Uses Magnetic Fossils to Navigate Changing Oceans

Geobiologist Courtney Wagner uses giant magnets and microscopic fossils to make sense of ancient climate change

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Ancient Pollen Offers Clues to How Plants Adapted to Climate Change in the Past — and Potentially the Future

A new study finds that plants around the world moved poleward during a dynamic period of rising temperatures 56 million years ago

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How a Smithsonian Botanist Cracked the Cactus Code a Century Ago

Celebrate National Cactus Day by meeting the pioneering botanist, Joseph Nelson Rose

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Celebrate Black Birders Week and More Natural History Programs This May

Tune into programs about ancient mummies, resilient coral and the evolution of skin tone

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What Mummified Shrews and Giant Hornets Reveal About Biodiversity

Celebrate Earth Day by revisiting stories about the museum’s research on a bevy of bizarre and wonderful creatures

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Get to Know the Scientist Studying How Parasitic Flies Stomach Bat Blood

Microbiologist Kelly Speer uses museum specimens to study blood-feeding insects and their mammalian hosts

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Explore How Chimpanzees Perceive Gender and More Natural History Programs This April

Tune in to programs about tiny human relatives, fungus-farming ants and more through the Smithsonian National Museum of Natural History

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The Hybridized Nature of Washington's Iconic Cherry Trees

For the 110th anniversary of their arrival to DC, we explore the biology of these charismatic clones

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120 3-D-Printed Statues of Women Redefine What Scientists Look Like

“IfThenSheCan – The Exhibit” takes over Smithsonian March 5-27