Steffen Bock brings prehistory into the present. With proto-reptile early tetrapod skulls produced by 3D printing, creative writing workshops, and virtual reality excavations, his team captivates a broad audience with the fossil discoveries of the Bromacker site in Thuringia.
The small plastic skull belongs to an early tetrapod that lived millions of years ago in what is today the Thuringian Forest. Steffen Bock holds it in his hand, opening its jaws. It is a scientifically precise replica of an actual skull, created with a 3D printer. Paleontologists unearthed the original at the Bromacker fossil deposit in the Thuringian Forest. Orobates pabsti was an approximately 80-centimeter-long, lizard-like terrestrial vertebrate. A herbivore.
At Bromacker, researchers reconstruct an ecosystem that existed 290 million years ago during the Permian period, long before the age of the dinosaurs, when much smaller quadrupedal vertebrates such as Orobates pabsti roamed a vast river valley in Thuringia. “The organisms of the Permian era often remain overshadowed by the large, voracious dinosaurs of the Mesozoic periods (Triassic, Jurassic, and Cretaceous), which dominate our imagination – yet these giants did not arise out of nowhere,” explains Steffen Bock, who previously worked at the Museum für Naturkunde Berlin. “What we uncovered at Bromacker laid the foundation for life on land – for dinosaurs as well as for the ancestors of modern mammals.”
Bock was in charge of the scientific communication for the BROMACKER project. His team aims to spark enthusiasm for the world before dinosaurs and to establish the site’s reputation for what it truly is: Europe’s most prolific locality for bone fossils and tracks of early tetrapods from the Permian period – a paleontological treasure chamber.
Steffen Bock is a communicator. He knows how to engage people – especially when he himself is enthusiastic about something: beetles, spiders, plants, or fossils, for instance. The latter fascinate him because they are hidden gateways into the evolutionary history of life. “A paleontological excavation is like a treasure hunt, where one hopes to discover something new behind every piece of rock,” says Bock. “And once it is found, the research begins.”
A passion for nature: spiders, beetles, skins and fossils
Before the fossilized nature of prehistoric times captivated him, it was the living world of the present that held his attention. Steffen Bock grew up in Berlin-Hellersdorf and in the green outskirts of the metropolis. In his grandfather’s garden he learned to identify animals and plants, while his bookshelf filled with field guides. It was inevitable – studying biology had to follow; more precisely: the study of biodiversity, evolution, and ecology at the Free University of Berlin. His initial focus was on beetles, later on spiders, and ultimately on the interactions between animals and plants. To this day, his left forearm is adorned with elaborate tattoos of his favourite beetles – and his apartment resembles a jungle.
Twelve years ago, he first joined the Museum für Naturkunde Berlin, volunteering alongside his studies in the spider and beetle collections, and later in the management of the mammal collection. For his master’s thesis and subsequent research project, he focused on the preservation of the skin collection. He investigated how objects threatened by decay could be secured for the future. Already back then, he began to speak publicly about this little-studied niche topic. “I thought: we need to communicate much more – why doesn’t everyone in research do this?”
When the Bromacker excavations resumed in 2020 after a ten-year hiatus, the opportunity arose to communicate research on a large scale – and to test new formats of engagement with the public. From the outset, the project, funded by the former Federal Ministry of Education and Research, was also conceived as a public initiative. Together with the three project partners Friedenstein Stiftung Gotha, Friedrich Schiller University Jena and the UNESCO Global Geopark Thuringia Inselsberg – Drei Gleichen, Steffen Bock developed a comprehensive communication strategy. The slogan “Bromacker is for everyone” remains valid to this day.
An open excavation – online and on site
“We started in 2020, right in the middle of the coronavirus pandemic, and at first brought people along to the excavation via live streams on social media,” says Bock. The BROMACKER team, consisting of about 40 project participants, made the entire research process transparent – from the excavation itself, through the preparation of the fossils, to the analysis of the finds using CT scans and other innovative methods. “It was important to me that the researchers themselves take charge of communication and learn how to engage with people,” Bock explains. “We provided them with various formats to do so, since not everyone immediately feels called upon to stand in front of a television camera.”
Bromacker has evolved into a transparent excavation. During the summer excavation weeks the site is open to everyone and one can watch the international team at work from a visitor platform. On weekends, a shuttle bus takes visitors from Gotha (about 21 kilometres away) to the site; on excursion days entire school classes arrive. A Visitor Care Manager approaches guests, invites them to join guided tours, and answers questions. This role rotates among the researchers. “At first they were skeptical, but in the end most found the dialogue highly stimulating.”
At his desk in the Museum für Naturkunde Berlin, Steffen Bock had a pair of cardboard virtual reality glasses that hold a smartphone behind their lenses. Once you put them on, you find yourself immersed in the Bromacker excavation: paleontologists strike tirelessly with hammer and chisel against the reddish sandstone. You can turn your head and look around as though you were standing right among them.
The glasses are one of many ideas that the team have developed to engage the public. With the help of the technology created by digital curator Anastasia Voloshina, anyone can become part of the excavation. In fact, the Bromacker excavation is thoroughly digital. On the Instagram channel bromacker_chroniken, the team presents the latest discoveries from the Thuringian site in text and video; on the project website explore.bromacker.de, visitors can navigate through the excavation and have researchers explain their work.
A project especially close to Steffen Bock’s heart was the BROMACKER stories workshop , in which school students practiced creative writing together with an author. Moving stories emerged, such as “Life as a Stone” , told from the perspective of a fossil: “I have long since stopped feeling the hooves of the animals. Everything grows quiet, yet that does not trouble me – no, in fact, it is beautiful.”
When younger people engage with fossils, immerse themselves in their perspective, or when adults begin to understand what researchers actually do – then Steffen Bock is satisfied. The local community, which was initially somewhat skeptical, has since come to appreciate the openness of the project and regarded it as valuable, as a survey revealed.
“Some initially came to us with an idea of Jurassic Park,” he says. “But we explained to them that we are not searching for spectacular T. rex fossils – which do not exist here anyway – but are instead pursuing relevant research questions.” Such as how the ecosystem at Bromacker might have functioned 290 million years ago: for example, how great the biodiversity was and what kind of environment the early tetrapods lived in at that time. Or how climate, geology, and living conditions have changed over the course of millions of years. All of this is embedded in the sediments and fossils: evidence of climate change, of evolution, of plate tectonics. One only has to be able to recognize it – and to speak about it.
Text: Mirco Lomoth with additions by the MfN (11 September 2025)
Fotos: Pablo Castagnola