{"id":11631,"date":"2018-05-02T14:43:32","date_gmt":"2018-05-02T14:43:32","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.tmc.edu\/news\/curated-10\/"},"modified":"2019-08-16T15:04:06","modified_gmt":"2019-08-16T15:04:06","slug":"curated-10","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.tmc.edu\/news\/2018\/05\/curated-10\/","title":{"rendered":"Death by Natural Causes at the Houston Museum of Natural Science"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Snakes, paint, flowers, frogs, flies. Who knew there were so many ways to die?<\/p>\n<p>Displayed in a charming Victorian setting,<em>Death by Natural Causes<\/em>, a new exhibit at the <strong><a href=\"https:\/\/www.hmns.org\/exhibits\/special-exhibitions\/death-by-natural-causes\/\">Houston Museum of Natural Science<\/a><\/strong> (HMNS), examines multiple ways people can perish.<\/p>\n<p>Certain animals, vegetables and minerals can be deadly\u2014directly or indirectly.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe focused on things that knowingly cause human death,\u201d said Nicole Temple, vice president of youth education at\u00a0HMNS and curator of the exhibit. \u201cIt is kind of a dark topic, but we tried to make it educational and fun by adding in some jokes and gently correcting misinformation, while adding to knowledge that visitors already have.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>One part of the exhibit traces the evolution of human knowledge surrounding deadly minerals and chemicals. Another features toxic plants, including mushrooms, poison ivy and angel trumpets.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThere are a lot of beautiful plants that are toxic and there are so many varieties of mushrooms. A lot of the really dangerous mushrooms are very similar-looking to mushrooms that are not only harmless, but also delicious,\u201d said Spencer Greene, M.D., medical advisor to the exhibit and local toxicologist. \u201cIf you are not an expert on foraging for mushrooms, you just shouldn\u2019t do it.\u201d<\/p>\n<p><em>Death by Natural Causes<\/em> also contains several live venomous snakes and deadly bugs from the HMNS private collection.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThe things in your neighborhood are the things you need to know about\u2014snakes come to mind, and some of the arthropods [insects, spiders and crustaceans],\u201d said Greene, who is director of toxicology at Baylor College of Medicine. \u201cThese deaths are really rare. To die from a snake bite in the United States is exceptionally uncommon; there are fewer than 10 deaths per year.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>In the Lone Star State, the snake to watch out for is the Texas coral snake.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThere are three kinds of coral snakes in the United States\u2014 Arizona, Texas and Florida,\u201d Greene explained. \u201cAs you go West to East, the more dangerous they get. These snakes cause a lot of pain. &#8230; It\u2019s kind of a neurologic and neuropathic pain when they envenomate you, but rarely do they do anything else.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>And there is an upside to these potentially deadly critters.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cHopefully, visitors will realize all of the benefits\u00a0of these venomous animals. As scary as they may be &#8230; they serve an important role in nature and in human health. Medicines are derived\u00a0from some of the venom components,\u201d Greene said.<\/p>\n<p>As visitors wander through different galleries in the exhibit, soft piano music wafts from the speakers. Throughout, interactive features keep children and adults occupied, whether by swiping through the periodic table of elements or guessing a victim&#8217;s cause of death based on a series of clues.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe wanted each gallery to have at least one interactive\u00a0exhibit to keep visitors engaged,\u201d Temple said. \u201cThe periodic table of elements shows visitors the basic elements\u00a0you need to be alive, the things that you need to stay alive and then it shows you the problematic elements that can kill you. There are a lot of overlaps in these elements; it all depends on the dosage.\u201d<\/p>\n<p><em>Death by Natural Causes<\/em> will be on display at the Houston Museum of Natural Science, 5555 Hermann Park Dr., through September 4.\u00a0Information: 713-639-4629 or hmns.org.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Snakes, paint, flowers, frogs, flies. Who knew there were so many ways to die? Displayed in a charming Victorian setting,Death by Natural Causes, a new exhibit at the Houston Museum of Natural Science (HMNS), examines multiple ways people can perish. Certain animals, vegetables and minerals can be deadly\u2014directly or indirectly. \u201cWe focused on things that [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":6,"featured_media":11635,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[57,2661,2663,2497,2341,230,2662],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v22.5 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>Death by Natural Causes at the Houston Museum of Natural Science - TMC News<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.tmc.edu\/news\/2018\/05\/curated-10\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Death by Natural Causes at the Houston Museum of Natural Science - TMC News\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Snakes, paint, flowers, frogs, flies. Who knew there were so many ways to die? Displayed in a charming Victorian setting,Death by Natural Causes, a new exhibit at the Houston Museum of Natural Science (HMNS), examines multiple ways people can perish. Certain animals, vegetables and minerals can be deadly\u2014directly or indirectly. \u201cWe focused on things that [&hellip;]\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.tmc.edu\/news\/2018\/05\/curated-10\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"TMC News\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2018-05-02T14:43:32+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2019-08-16T15:04:06+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/www.tmc.edu\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2019\/06\/Curated-2-1.jpg\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"1200\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"800\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/jpeg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Britni R. McAshan\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"Britni R. 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