The Exploratorium is a public science museum, located in the Marina District at the Palace of Fine Arts in San Francisco, California. It is one of San Francisco's most popular museums, drawing over 500,000 people each year.
Founded in 1969 by the physicist Dr. Frank Oppenheimer, the Exploratorium is dedicated to teaching science through hands-on exhibits. Many of its exhibits are created by visual and performing artists as well as scientists and educators. Exhibit designs that have been created at the Exploratorium often are duplicated for other science museums worldwide. Some exhibits, of course, can't be duplicated, such as the off-site Wave Organ, a unique sonic experience located on a nearby point of land jutting into San Francisco Bay. The Exploratorium also features the Tactile Dome, a three-dimensional pitch-black labyrinth that visitors must navigate using the sense of touch.
The Exploratorium has an extensive website with many online science exhibits and experiments, which has received the Webby Award for Best Science Site five times since 1997.
