The New Mexico Museum of Natural History & Science in Albuquerque consists of a museum, a planetarium and the Lockheed Martin Dynatheater, which offers digital 3D films on a five-story high screen. The museum preserves and interprets the distinctive natural and scientific heritage of the state of New Mexico through extraordinary collections, research and exhibits. The museum’s aims to inspire a greater appreciation and understanding of the natural world.

Startup is the first museum exhibit in the world to be dedicated to the development of the micro-computer. It is the brainchild of Paul G. Allen, co-founder of Microsoft and philanthropist, and was his way to give back to the Albuquerque community that had supported him and Bill Gates during the early years of their work. The exhibit looks at early computers and shows how they completely changed the way that we work, live and play. The exhibit aims to capture and portray the excitement of the early days of personal computers and does so with one-of-a-kind artifacts, videos and interactive displays.

Emergence examines how and why life started on Earth. Constantly updated, the exhibit presents the latest scientific research from around the globe. The first part of the exhibit looks at the six elements that have been present on earth since its beginning 4.6 billion years ago: carbon, hydrogen, nitrogen, oxygen, phosphorus and sulfur. Those elements make up everything on earth, past, present and future. Museum visitors are shown how the earth was formed and are given a timeline for Earth’s development, from its early atmosphere, to the emergence of life, first as single-cell organisms and then, many millions of years later, as entities made up of many cells. The exhibit traces the history of the earth through the ice ages and then takes a glimpse at the planet that we live on today.

1801 Mountain Rd NW, Albuquerque, NM 87104, Phone: 904-825-4602

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