Encyclopedia Smithsonian

Use fossils as a thermometer to read temperatures 55 million years ago. You can also watch a video of a fossil digger at work. 

Animals and plants of the New World are included in this rain forest habitat featuring a re-created microcosm of the world's largest rain forest and the Amazon River.

This showcase features a 11.5-meter tubular core sample that shows physical and biological effects of Earth's collision with a giant asteroid 65 million years ago, which resulted in the extinction of the dinosaurs.

This exhibition explains the important role the atmosphere plays in our lives and in the environment by examining its evolution and properties and its effects on plants, animals, and people.

This exhibition uses the El Nino weather phenomenon to demonstrate the dynamic interrelations among the Earth's 4 components.

Explore the Arctic’s changing climate. Discover what these changes mean for the Arctic, its wildlife, its people—and the rest of the planet.

This exhibition is home to dozens of invertebrate species -- the most abundant creatures on earth -- from sea stars to spiny lobsters, to giant African millipedes, to tarantulas, to a giant Pacific octopus.

This major exhibition hall focuses on the story of human origins and probes the ecological and genetic connections that human beings have had with the natural world over time.

Dive in with Phoenix -- a model of an actual North Atlantic right whale -- and discover how the ocean is a global system essential to all life in this exhibition featuring hundreds of preserved marine specimens, a living coral reef, and many interactive displays. 

Web feature presented by the Natural History Museum's Department of Paleobiolgy.

The Ocean Portal is a unique, interactive online experience that inspires awareness, understanding, and stewardship of the world’s Ocean, developed by the Smithsonian Institution’s National Museum of Natural History and more than 20 collaborating organizations.

Explore science at the Smithsonian through video, feature article, photos and more.

The Department of Collections and Research at the National Air and Space Museum consists of five research and curatorial divisions: Archives Division, Collections Division, Aeronautics and Space History Divisions, and the Center for Earth and Planetary Studies.

The Carrie-Bow Marine Field Station studies coral reefs and mangroves of coastal Belize, Natural History Museum.

Performs original research on planetary science, terrestrial geophysics, environmental change.

Preserves threatened species and habitats through research, professional training and environmental education. National Zoo

The Zoo's GIS Lab is using satellite imagery and GIS to identify, monitor and fight habitat loss and species extinction globally.

Examines linked ecosystems at the land-sea interface, especially those impacted by human activities.

Investigates Earth's land biotas throughout their 400 million year history. The goal is to understand how terrestrial ecosystems have been structured and how they change over geologic time.

The Smithsonian Marine Station (SMS) at Fort Pierce, Florida is a research center specializing in marine biodiversity and ecosystems of Florida.