Exhibits

Your Gateway to the Universe

Come explore over 500 million years of history and science and let your inner scientist come out to play!

Discover the natural world through the North Museum’s many exhibits- from live animals and interactive displays to the beautifully displayed birds, mammals, fossils and minerals.

Light up your curiosity and imagination while learning how Scientists and Inventors are using their knowledge of the natural world to create new, amazing, and life-changing advances in Science, Technology, Engineering, and Math (STEM).

Dinosaurs Among Us

The next time you dodge a pigeon on the sidewalk, watch a sparrow eat from a feeder in a backyard, or order chicken for dinner, know that you just had an encounter with a modern dinosaur. Dinosaurs never really vanished from Earth. Most did go extinct, but their evolutionary legacy lives on all around us, in birds.

The exhibition Dinosaurs Among Us will highlight the unbroken line between the charismatic dinosaurs that dominated the planet for about 170 million years and modern birds. The panels feature large-scale color illustrations of familiar and newly discovered extinct dinosaur species as they would have looked in life.

Organized by the American Museum of Natural History in New York with support from North Museum of Nature and Science, United States; Philip J. Currie Museum, Canada; Museo de Ciencias, Universidad de Navarra, Spain; and Universum Museo de las Ciencias de la UNAM, Mexico, Dinosaurs Among Us explores the practically obsolete boundary between the animals we call birds and those we traditionally called dinosaurs.

Live Animal Room

Get to know more than twenty different species of animals in the North Museum’s Live Animal Room. Say hello to snakes, lizards, degus, turtles, toads, tarantulas, and more on your next visit.

Explore the Live Animal Room

Lego Lab – Temporarily Closed

Take engineering to new heights at our LEGO LAB exhibit. Perfect for North Museum guests of all ages, this corner of the museum will help Pre-K visitors develop fine motor skills, while school aged guests use mathematical thinking, planning and problem solving to develop both free standing structures and designs attached to our LEGO boarded walls. We can’t wait to see what you’ll create!

The Coding Corner –Temporarily Closed

Welcome to our newest STEM exhibit: the Coding Corner. It’s the museum’s hub for computer and math learning through games, activities, and play!

Activities may include (subject to change):

  • Sphero Bots
  • Robot Mouse
  • Solar / Salt-water Powered Robo Cars
  • VR Goggles
  • Pixel Activities
  • Code Gamer

Explore the Past

This part of the museum features a full-size dinosaur model, a view of Pennsylvania 200 million years ago, and many dinosaur skulls and bones. Get hands-on! Visitors can handle real fossils and bones in this interactive Paleontology Gallery.  With an in-depth look at T. Rex, (the tyrant lizard king) and the opportunity to get up close to prehistoric life, this exhibit is sure to please dinosaur lovers young and old.

Explore Nature Gallery

This fun-filled space incorporates science and nature in a fun, hands-on area. The space includes the live, glass-walled observation bee hive, interactive tree model, digital microscope, and ever-changing informative displays. Also, be sure to check out the amazing floor tile that helps illustrate the topography of our Susquehanna River Basin. Come play with nature!

STEAM Art Gallery

The North Museum of Nature and Science, STEAM Art Gallery promotes regional artwork that is inspired by science and nature.  Being a leader in the conversation around Science, Technology, Engineering, Art and Math (STEAM) the North Museum showcases artwork in the STEAM Gallery creating a link between science and art.

Virtual Exhibit
Pandemic in Progress: Understanding COVID-19

Inside our interactive exhibit, you’ll learn about viruses like COVID-19, be introduced to Genomic Sequencing, get to know Hometown Hero, Ambassador-at-Large, Deborah L. Birx, M.D, and discover ways you can make a difference! Educational materials accompanying the exhibit are also available for download.

COVID-19 digital panels generously provided by New York Hall of Science and New York Presbyterian.

Transmissions: Gone Viral graphic novel provided by  New York Hall of Science, a project supported by the National Institute of General Medical Sciences, the National Institute of Health under Award Number R25GM129168.

Note: Many of the exhibits have videos or website links! Be sure to click the button on the upper right hand side of the exhibit until you see “Media” – click on the link button to go to the destination!

View Exhibit

Ornithology Room

Let your imagination take flight.  Down on the Museum’s lowest level you will find a wide variety of birds displayed in beautiful, antique cases. This prized collection of both rare and local specimens wonderfully represents the amazing world of birds.  There are examples of both present day and pre-20th century taxidermy.  Whether you are an avid birder or you just want to know what bird was at your feeder this morning, this exhibit leaves an impression.

The exhibit is also home some birds that can only see in a museum.  The Heath Hen, Carolina Parakeet and the Passenger Pigeon all represent species that have been lost to extinction in North America.

Nano

Come explore this interactive, bilingual exhibit that engages science, engineering and technology on a nanoscale.   Hands-on exhibits present the basics of nanoscience and introduce some real world applications for this typically unseen world.

The Fluorescent Rock Box
Currently Under Maintenance 

Uncover a hidden world of color in the North Museum’s exhibit, the “Rock Box”.  Designed in partnership with local company, ATOMIC, this three-dimensional exhibit describes the science behind light.

The “Rock Box” exhibit allows visitors to view these hidden sights through a combination of curated specimens from the Museum’s own geology collections, and different ultraviolet light wavelengths.  This mixture of nature and science work together to produce a vibrant, fluorescent display revealing what was once unseen.

Geology Room

A rock-lover’s paradise, the Geology Room offers a tantalizing look at the Earth’s many rocks and minerals.  Our antique display cases show off many geological finds, while the newer cases  are filled with informative displays.  One case contains the display entitled, “Mineral Mysteries”, developed after a STEM Sisters event, that demonstrates how different minerals play a role in everyone’s daily life. These exhibits and a special scavenger hunt encourage you to discover and learn more about Geology down in the Museum’s lower level.


STEM sisters

Inspire, empower and ignite your passion for STEM Careers.

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North Museum Science & Engineering Fair

Support innovative student scientists who are changing the world.

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