Metarex, the world’s first collection of dinosaur-fossil NFTs, unveils its whitepaper committing to its mission of keeping incredibly valuable fossils out of private hands. The platform launches 59,000 NFTs representing the bones of 1 of 32 remaining T. rex fossils in the world. Once the softcap has been reached, using smart contracts, Metarex will automatically purchase the physical T.rex and place it under the care of a museum, making the fossils available to paleontologists for research purposes.
T. rex by the name of Stan sold for almost $32 million recently, breaking the previous record of $8.3 million in 1997. Museums and academic institutions simply can’t compete with these prices. Fossils are increasingly falling into private ownership of the wealthy, preventing paleontologists from studying them, since private fossil research is invalid and cannot be published in academic journals. Considering how rare fossils are, the shift to private fossil collections is worrying for paleontologists whose job is to preserve and research these artifacts.
Metarex leverages blockchain and NFT technology to help academics regain access to historical artifacts, all whilst granting crypto enthusiasts a chance to own a stake in a piece of history. The 58,000 NFTs of separate bones and 1,000 NFTs of the whole T. rex are 3D images of the actual fossil bones, each one granting its holder 0.10-percent ownership of the chosen bones online IP rights to one of the bones. At greater than 45 percent density completion, it surpasses museum standards, which often require a fossil to have more than 20 percent of its original bones discovered. The NFT sale is expected to start on December 7th on the Metarex platform which facilitates purchases using MetaMask or any other Ethereum-based wallet after passing a KYC.
“This project is groundbreaking, considering how rare these fossils are, as there are only 32 Tyrannosaurus rex left in the world,” says COO and Co-Founder Edwin Mata. “We needed state-of-the-art blockchain technology for the Metarex, but it’s a true story that began 66 million years ago. We can now bridge present, past, and future, all while decentralizing historical artifacts and making them accessible to the academic community and the world itself.”
“What we are creating here is the coolest thing to happen to the NFT world as we are taking an actual Tyrannosaurus rex skeleton and sticking it onto the blockchain,” says CEO, and Co-Founder Jeff Jaffrey. “What child did not dream of owning his own dinosaur? More importantly, this project will create previously inaccessible funding from the crypto world for the academic sector. As you can see, this is not just an NFT, this is history! We welcome everyone to join the NFT revolution!”
