Filming Dung in Tennessee for Geek Week on MSNBC

Dr. Jim Mead discussing the importance of his collection

Go To Team’s Jimmy Hall hit the road for Johnson City, Tennessee to shoot for MSNBC’s The Rachel Maddow show’s Geek Week special.  The crew met with the one and only Big Bad Doo Doo Daddy, or as his colleagues like to call him Dr. Jim Mead.   Dr. Mead is the chair of East Tennessee State University’s Department of Geoscience and paleontologist extraordinaire, he is also the proud curator of the largest collection of prehistoric dung in the world.  But no one collects dung because it smells nice. Mr. Mead can provide samples to scientists who extract DNA to learn about fauna of the past. Mr. Mead estimates that he has about 100 ice-age turds (his word) with potentially extractable DNA, including one that might be as much as 30,000 years old.  East Tennessee State’s Don Sundquist Center of Excellence in Paleontology serves as the research umbrella for the nearby Gray Fossil Site, a Miocene sinkhole that state-highway contractors unearthed 10 years ago. The site houses a museum and laboratory where you can actually watch the dig outside and the extraction of the fossil in the lab. GTT shot the piece using the HDX 900. Check out the video to find out more!

Jimmy Hall pans and tilts on poo