The Royal Ontario Museum is Canada's largest and most comprehensive museum of world cultures and natural history. Established in 1912, it opened to the public in 1914. The museum's collections encompass over 13 million artworks, cultural objects, and natural history specimens, which are housed in more than 40 galleries and exhibition spaces. Its significant holdings include one of the world's premier collections of dinosaurs and a renowned assemblage of Chinese art and artifacts, featuring tomb artifacts, Buddhist sculptures, and architectural pieces. The museum also holds extensive collections related to Near Eastern, African, and European cultures, as well as Canadian and First Peoples history. A major architectural expansion, the Michael Lee-Chin Crystal, was completed in 2007, adding a distinctive modernist structure to the original heritage building. The institution is a major international research facility, actively involved in scientific fieldwork and academic study across numerous disciplines, including archaeology, paleontology, and mineralogy. It serves as a vital educational resource for the public and academic community.