Field Museum jumps onto Shark Week bandwagon

The Field Museum joined in the Shark Week mania to announce Monday that its new “Shark Sex” exhibit will swim into the museum in late July.

“DNA Discovery: Shark Sex” will open as part of the existing research-oriented DNA Discovery Center on July 29.

Despite what the title might suggest, “the exhibition concept centers around sharks’ unusual reproductive strategies rather than the mating practice itself,” said Taylor Peterson, media and interactives coordinator for the museum. The exhibit is not aimed at any particular age group.

“Shark Sex” will focus on four different reproductive phenomena found in certain types of sharks — sawfish, lemon and sand tiger sharks, Peterson said. For example, sand tiger shark embryos will sometimes eat one another in the womb, she said.

The museum’s only lemon shark will be moved to a viewing window in the shark exhibit, she said. There is another viewing window into the lab where visitors can watch lab manager Kevin Feldheim and his colleagues at work in the Pritzker Laboratory for Molecular Systematics and Evolution.

The DNA Discovery Center is open 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. during the museum’s operating hours and is free with basic admission, Peterson said. “Talk to A Scientist Hour” with the lab’s scientists runs from 11 a.m. to noon.

“Questions don’t have to be shark-specific,” she said. Visitors can ask the scientists about other areas of their genetics work as well.

The new exhibit will be built with money from a grant from the Institute of Museum and Library Services, Peterson said. The grant money has made the creation of many smaller gallery exhibitions possible throughout the museum.