Phylogenetic study needs to learn both external and internal morphology of specimens which requires inevitable destructive dissection. The rare and important specimens nonetheless do not allow any destructive operation. The present work used CT and 3D visualizing technique to image a fossil giant panda skull

the earliest and the most complete one so far in the world

as well as an extant giant panda skull for comparison

segmented and reconstructed the 3D images and virtually dissected their paranasal sinuses for new anatomic data.