A traveling children's exhibit that reveals the biomechanics of giant robot animals to illustrate how real animals work.
Size:
5,000 square feet
Itinerary:
The exhibit is currently touring science and natural-history museums and zoos in North America and Europe.
Highlights:
Eight giant robot animals and more than a dozen hands-on activities reveal the magic of nature as a master engineer.
Robot Body Shop - As an introduction to the exhibit, drum-mounted machine parts allow visitors to manipulate some of the mechanical devices they will see used to construct the robots, such as hinges, pumps, springs and shock absorbers.
Chameleon Activity Stations - Visitors get to control the giant robotic chameleon. At the three different stations, one can change its color, move its body, head, eyes and tongue. Chameleons change color for two reasons, to hide from an enemy or to attract or scare another chameleon.
Tongue Gun - Triggering a joystick on the model of a robot chameleon’s head fires a long tongue at insect targets to show how the reptile catches food.
Hide and Seek - Children can blend in like a chameleon. Wearing a coat that matches a wall in the background, kids can watch themselves appear and disappear on a video monitor.
Race a Squid - Visitors can pump air into a squid model and propel it up a tube to simulate the high-speed swim of a giant squid. Visitors will enjoy racing these four squids to the finish line. The real creature sucks water into its body and squirts the water out a small tube under its head, shooting away backwards at up 20 miles per hour.
Hear’s Seeing You - When visitors aim the robot bat’s head at insect targets, a digital display reveals the distance to each bug to demonstrate echolocation—a bat’s sonar system for hunting prey at night.
Swat the Fly - This activity tests participants’ reaction time (about one-twelfth as fast a house fly’s). Visitors use their hands to “swat” each fly as it lights up.
Sticky Feet - Visitors wearing special hand pads can try to stick like flies to a sloping surface.
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