The phrase "almost complete specimen" is correct and usable in written English.
It can be used in contexts such as scientific research, archaeology, or any field where specimens are studied or collected, indicating that the specimen is not fully intact but is close to being so.
Example: "The archaeologists were excited to discover an almost complete specimen of an ancient pottery shard during their excavation."
Alternatives: "nearly complete specimen" or "partially complete specimen".
Scientists not involved in the new research hailed its importance, placing the Ardi skeleton on a pedestal alongside notable figures of hominid evolution like Lucy and the 1.6-million-year-old Turkana Boy from Kenya, an almost complete specimen of Homo erectus with anatomy remarkably similar to modern Homo sapiens.
Many specimens of ammonites, belemnites and bivalves were found during quarrying, in addition to an almost complete specimen of a Pliosaur.
Specimen CNU-MEC-NN-2015002p/c, part and counterpart (Figs. 4 and 5) is an almost complete specimen with well-preserved body and wings; female.
Holotype: CNU-Der-NN2008002 (coll. Shih Chungkun), an almost complete specimen, is housed in the Key Lab of Insect Evolution & Environmental Changes, the College of Life Sciences, Capital Normal University (CNU), Beijing.
Guinness' certificate claims that the specimens are almost complete skeletons and include 368 psittacosaurid specimens, 391 dromaeosaurid specimens, 255 Anchiornis specimens, 22 Jeholosaurus specimens, and 70 other rare dinosaurs and unnamed dinosaur fossils.
Fossils include the petrified bones of an almost complete crocodile and a specimen of plesiosaurus measuring 15 feet in length, and 8 feet in breadth was discovered in 1841.
Also, none of the other early specimens include almost complete skulls, which are considered more revealing of a fossil species' place in the hominid family.
Similar amounts of silent-site variation were observed when the almost complete mtDNA sequence of the Australian specimen was added to the analysis (πsynonymous = 7.9%; πtelomere = 4.4%), meaning that on average the two Hawaiian mtDNAs were more different from each other than they were from that of the Australian isolate.
There are two stuffed specimens of the extinct great auk, an almost complete skeleton of an extinct moa and a large collection of specimens from the Yorkshire region including the remains of elephants, cave bears and hyena from Kirkdale Cave dated to the Quaternary period, around 125,000 years ago.
