Current Exhibits
First Floor
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Space Command offers 30 interactive stations. Stop by Outerspace Outfitters to check out authentic space gear and practice completing a task “in space" while wearing bulky gloves in a vacuum chamber. Next head over to Remote Command to recover a lost unmanned space probe using the same techniques scientists use to manipulate exploration devices on planets. In Space Academy learn about the affects of gravity and the history of space exploration, and touch a five-billion-year-old chunk of meteorite. KidScience: Island of the Elements, exclusively for 5-8 year olds, introduces basic properties of air, water, earth and light. Discover energy and its effects as children board a ship, climb a lighthouse, power a real waterwheel and navigate mazes. The Train Factory invites students to experience a 19th century machine shop and ride a 350-ton steam locomotive built in 1926. Students will explore concepts such as steam, pressure, friction and electric and magnetic force, and use observational skills, making and testing hypotheses. |
Second Floor
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The Franklin Air Show is an indoor carnival with games and contests demonstrating properties of flight, a pilot training school-complete with a flight simulator ($3 additional), a T-33 jet trainer and the restored Wright Model B Flyer. Rathmann Hall of ScienceThe Giant Heart: A Healthy Interactive Experience see here. Electricity Hall explores electricity and its applications through experiments, allowing students to interact with static electricity, motors, magnetism and telegraphy. Check the daily schedule for the free, electrifying “Ben's Curiosity Show.” Franklin Gallery/Franklin…He's Electric! looks at Franklin's accomplishments as a scientist and inventor, providing insights into science and history. |
Mandell Center
Direct access from 2nd and 3rd floors
SkyBike provides a heart-pounding ride of a lifetime and physics lesson all in one. Minimum height 56"; must weigh less than 250 pounds. Additional $2 at attraction.
Tutankhamun and the Golden Age of the Pharaohs through September 30.
Star Wars: Where Science Meets Imagination, is highlighted on here. Opens February 8.
Amazing Machines opens May 10, 2008.
Third Floor
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Identity: An Exhibition of You invites visitors to explore how chemistry, genetics and socialization all help determine who we are. Opens November 16. The Sports Challenge uses interactive experiences to demonstrate the role of science in sports from velocity, momentum and friction to balance, vision and reflex. Electricity Hall explores electricity and its applications through experiments, allowing students to interact with static electricity, motors, magnetism and telegraphy. Check the daily schedule for the free, electrifying “Ben's Curiosity Show.” Sir Isaac's Loft: Where Art and Physics Collide illustrates basic principles of physics in an art gallery setting. Interactives demonstrate chain reactions, light, motion and energy. See artworks that use science to play with your mind. |
Fourth Floor
Joel N. Bloom Rooftop Observatory is newly renovated. Weather and staff permitting, get safely filtered close-up views of the sun using our 10-inch Zeiss refractor telescope, and see other bodies in space as they are available using several new, computerized reflector telescopes.
Benjamin Franklin National Memorial
The official national memorial to Franklin, this 82-foot marble rotunda houses a 30-ton statue of Franklin, as well as artifacts related to or belonging to him.