IS 



Art and Science 

 Collide in the 

 American Museum 

 of Natural History's 

 New Space Show 



Cosmic Collisions Offers 



Rose Center Audiences 



a Crash Course in Astrophysics 



The spectacular new Space Show in the 

 Hayden Planetarium at the American 

 Museum of Natural History's Rose Center for 

 Earth and Space may feel like science fiction, 

 but it's not. Through cutting-edge computer 

 technology. Cosmic Collisions, narrated by 

 award-winning actor, director, and producer 

 Robert Redford, turns raw scientific data into 

 breathtaking 3-D images of cataclysmic 

 events in space. 



The production, two years in the making, 

 takes viewers on a thrilling journey — past, 

 present, and future to witness such explo- 



COLO 



sive encounters as a Mars-sized object smash- 

 ing into a young Earth to form our Moon, the 

 impact of the meteorite that doomed the 



dinosaurs 65 million years ago, and the pro- 

 jected collision of the Milky Way and 

 Andromeda galaxies in the far-distant future. 



More than 100 scientists from around the 

 world contributed their expertise to the proj- 

 ect, weighing astronomical observations 

 against predictions based on the laws of 

 physics to arrive at the most accurate render- 

 ings possible. The show's depiction of the 

 Milky Way and Andromeda galaxies on a col- 

 lision course, for example, is based on data- 

 driven computations of how the stars, gas, 

 and dark matter in the galaxies will behave 

 under the influence of gravity and gas pres- 

 sure over the next 6 billion years. The result 

 is a beautiful intergalactic ballet across the 

 Hayden Planetarium dome, the two galaxies 

 swirling and stretching away from each other 

 and coming back together again in a simulat- 

 ed sequence where each second equals the 

 passage of 40 million years. 



In other mathematically meticulous simula- 

 tions, interspersed with satellite images and 

 accompanied by seat-shaking vibrations, the 

 Show explores the secrets of the Sun, the 

 northern and southern lights, the remote but 

 disturbing possibility of a killer asteroid 



hitting Earth and what we might do about 

 it, and more. In the end, this engrossing, 

 immersive theater experience proves that 

 seemingly destructive processes are, in fact, 

 constructive, forming galaxies, changing the 

 course of life on Earth, and continuing to 

 transform the universe. 



Cosmic Collisions was developed by the American Museum 

 of Natural History. New York (www.amnh.org). in collabo- 

 ration with the Denver Museum of Nature & Science: 

 GOTO, lite, Tokyo. Japan; and the Shanghai Science and 

 Technology Museum 



Made possible with the generous support of 



Cosmic Collisions was created by the 

 American Museum of Natural History 

 with the major support and partnership 

 of the National Aeronautics and Space 

 Administration. Science Mission Directorate. 

 Hcliophysics Division. 



American Museum S Natural History© 



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