Exhibits

The exhibition is organised into 10 sections. The first 4 sections examine the devastating effects of some deadly diseases in human history. The other sections involve interactive displays where visitors can learn more about microbes and how they affect the human body. At the same time, they can have close-up views of microbes through various types of microscopes and learn about the scientific concepts and the effects of microbes in everyday life through video games and presentations. There are 11 interactive displays located throughout the exhibit to enhance the learning experience.

The exhibition also introduces the Microbe Man. He is the exhibit guide and friendly cartoon super-hero who hold special powers that help him in his arduous tasks. Microbe Man is the amazing ally who helps our "good microbes" combat disease and fight infection.

EXHIBIT SECTIONS
Paris Crypt
A robotic guide in a skull-filled catacomb below Paris describes the bubonic plague, which killed about 56 million Europeans from 1340 to 1420. He wears a beaked mask thought to protect people from the plague, which they believed was caused by poison gas rising from the Earth.

Egyptian Tomb
Inside this re-create tomb a photo of the unwrapped mummy of Ramses V shows pockmarks from the smallpox virus that attacked and probably killed Egypt's ruler, who died around 1151 B.C. The tomb also features a replica of a sarcophagus and a copy of an Egyptian stone tablet, which provided the first pictorial record of polio.

Aztec Ruins
Figurines dating from before 750 A.D. show evidence of diseases from which the peoples native to Central America when these figurines were made, they suggest that other disfiguring diseases attacked the peoples of what is now Mexico.

Main Street North America
This section describes epidemics of polio, flu and tuberculosis striking close to home. An iron lung from the 1950s offers a look at one of the respiration devices that helped save the lives of many polio survivors.

There is also a display of X-ray films of healthy and diseased lungs. Light spots representing tubercles on the diseased lungs show how lungs are infected by tuberculosis.

Another 3-min video presentation describes the discovery of penicillin in 1928 and the breakthrough of mass production as a "wonder drug" during World War II.

Microbe TV
Microbe Man and VJ Sabrina host a 90-second animated video that illustrates just how miniscule microbes really are.

Microbial Superhighway
Visitors enter an airplane fuselage to learn how modern transportation, overcrowding and pollution foster the spread of infectious disease around the world. An interactive world map illustrates the global distribution of age-old and emerging diseases. When visitors push a button to select a disease such as Ebola or cholera, fibre optics illuminate the map areas where the disease is found.

Microbial Universe
Visitors can explore a new cosmos, the hidden universe of microbes. Eight colourful, volumetric holograms floating in space present different microbes, including Ebola and E. Coli, as three-dimensional sculptures.

Images from an electron microscope and a Wentzscope light microscope offer a rare, close-up view of real microbes such as HIV, rabies and Ebola.

The electron microscope allows magnification to 4 millionths of an inch (0.0001mm) across the specimen. The Wentzscope microscope reflects light off the specimen to magnify its image up to 500 times its original size.

Animation in two giant robotic microbes, a robotic bacteriophage and a robotic protozoan attacking a paramecium, simulate how these microscopic organisms invade other microbes in real life.

Body of Disease
Exhibit-goers discover how harmful microbes invade human bodies and how humans fight back. Five hands-on displays demonstrate how people fight infection both with the body's natural defenses and with antibiotic defenses to prevent and treat infectious disease.

A football-style game - "Lines of Defense" demonstrates the body's natural line of defense against infectious disease. In the game of "virtual" microbe combat called "Antibiotic Artillery", players fire rounds of antibiotic ammunition at infectious bacteria. The object is to destroy as possible by using all antibiotics available to show the importance of completing the course of prescribed medication.

"Race a Bug" is a video game featuring a microbe race in 3-D animation. It illustrates how some microbes propel themselves. Two computer microbes pit against each other in a winding race to the finish line. Players maneuver their mobile microbes through simulated arteries in 3-D animation.

Pete's Place
In this re-created apartment setting, more hands-on displays reveal the beneficial and essential roles microbes' play. Visitors can turn an assembly of gears labeled "microbes", "air", "water", "plant", "sun", "land" and "animal" to demonstrate the essential part microbes play in sustaining life on Earth.

In the simulated kitchen, humorous narratives by talking, cartoon-like microbes relate how microbes affect the everyday fare people cook and eat. Examples of microbes at work in the kitchen making cheese, helping bread rise and making compost are described. Players of the Gobble De Goop video game can guide munching microbes using a joystick as they gobble up an oil spill. The Microbe Quiz Show, an interactive TV program hosted by Microbe Man, invites visitors to a true-false test of their microbial knowledge.

New Frontiers
A 3-D video presentation by renowned scientist Dr Anthony S Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID), describes advances in medical research, including gene therapy - delivering therapeutic genes to cells and the creation of synthetic drugs.