Air Mirror
Sit comfortably and check the stripy view at the end of the road. Now heat up the road. (A solid steel plate rapidly heats to 100°, warming the dark sand of…
Cold and Warm Light Mirrors
Without protection, the lamp in a slide projector would melt the valuable slide. How can you protect the slides? This exhibit shows the effect of different…
Critical Angle
When does total reflection begin? Light usually travels in a straight line. What happens when it encounters a boundary surface? Depending on the angle of…
Disappearing Glass Rods
Brought before your eyes: Optical density. Similar to how a drinking straw appears bent in a glass – here is another way to illustrate the phenomenon of…
Double Refraction in Calcite Crystals
Viewed through Iceland spar: The lettering appears doubled. Light entering this Iceland spar calcite crystal is split into two beams with opposite…
Droplet Fountain
This exhibit is not accessible during the winter months. A single drop falls and causes ripple patterns in the fountain. What happens to them at the edge of…
Experimental Stations 1 to 6
On a hexagonal table is a circus of hands-on activities, all to do with reflections in every-day life: What’s in a surface? Reflections off curved…
Fresnel Lens
Thin lens, big effect. When two visitors look at each other through this large Fresnel lens, they see the other person with an enormous upper body. Since…
Glass Bead Rainbow
Refracting light, reflecting light. Tiny glass beads illuminated by a flashlight: a rainbow appears! They act like prisms, these glass beads. They split the…
Hands-on Mirage
The laser beam brushing the surface of the hot plate is visible until you blow down through the hole. Your relatively cool breath above the hot plate makes a…
Light Island
Reflex – simply play with light. Direct light, mix light colors, experiment with the transparency of filters and materials, and explore refraction: freely…
Light Refraction
What paths does light take? Light travels in straight lines in a homogeneous medium like air or water. At the boundary between different materials, its…
Make the Invisible Visible
Convection made clear and observable. When water is heated, it expands. It becomes lighter and rises. In the less heated water, it creates swirls. The heat…
Nothing but air
With a dark field illumination (schlieren optics), the smallest changes in air density (refractive index) are made visible. The apparatus is so large that the…
Optical Lifting
More or less deep. Catching a fish with bare hands? A tricky task. Why? Where exactly is it swimming? Due to the refraction of light rays – when transitioning…
Spectra
Elements and their colors. Distinguishing individual hues from a color impression: it’s as challenging as identifying individual instruments in an orchestra.…
Total Internal Reflection
Trapped light. A tip for the dear citizens of Schilda: here’s how you could have brought light into the windowless town hall! The method is based on a…
Why is the Sky blue?
… and why does the sun blush? The sky could be black as night, couldn’t it? After all, we’re looking directly into the nearly black universe. To understand…
Acoustics
Aggregate states
Algorithms
Animals, plants, habitats
Atomic and quantum physics
Atomic structure
Automats
Biology
Buoyancy
Chaos
Characteristics of life
Chemical Reactions
Chemistry
Colors
Computer science
Cryptology
Currents
Data and information
Design elements
Earth sciences
Electricity
Electricity and energy
Electricity and magnetism
Elektromagnetismus
