MIT Museum

This World Oceans Day, we are thrilled to share the news of our upcoming thematic focus, which will be focused on OCEANS.

In line with this year's WOD theme, One Ocean, One Climate, One Future – Together, we will be unlocking our understanding of one of Earth’s greatest unknowns.

Running from September 2026 through March 2027, this series of exhibitions, programs, and events will uncover the complexity, beauty, and critical importance of the world’s oceans, while inspiring curiosity, courage, and human connection.

Featuring:
Marshmallow Laser Feast
Margaret and Christine Wertheim and the Institute For Figuring
and many more artists, scientists, designers and technologists who will be joining us to welcome visitors to immerse themselves in one of the world’s most fascinating and significant subjects.

Learn more: https://hubs.la/Q04kh-px0

Image: Marshmallow Laser Feast, Seeing Echoes in the Mind of the Whale, 2024, DHub Barcelona, photo by Sandra Campione

Marking fifty years since the 1976 Cambridge recombinant DNA debate, this day-long program brings together historians, scientists, policymakers, journalists, and artists for a conversation about how societies identify, debate, and govern world-changing technologies. The symposium asks questions that remain deeply relevant today: who raises the alarm, how institutions respond, and how public trust is built and sustained over time.

The symposium is presented in conjunction with the new theatrical production No Recombination Without Representation, with performances taking place at Sullivan Chamber in Cambridge City Hall.
Lunch will be provided.

Existential Risk, Emerging Technology and Democracy:
The Cambridge Recombinant DNA Debate 50 Years On
📅June 12, 2026
⏰9:00 am to 4:15 pm
🎟️$10 for MIT affiliates and $20 for the general public

Freezing Time: Edgerton and the Beauty of the Machine Age offers a new look at the inventions that enabled the manipulation of time and light by MIT scientist and researcher Harold ”Doc” Edgerton. Focused on the study of electric generators, he was inspired to use a primitive technology called a stroboscope invented in the 1830s. Edgerton, first as a graduate student and then with his students (most notably Kenneth Germeshausen and Herbert Grier) would transform the stroboscope and the high-speed flash into vital tools for the analysis of high-speed movement.

The exhibition lets visitors time-travel back to the 1930s and reexamine the importance of art and science to the development of Edgerton’s tools as well as reflect on important themes of speed, standardization, precision, efficiency, and scientific management.

The historic photographs featured in Freezing Time are being reprinted from the original negatives by Gus Kayafas (MIT Class of 1969), one of Harold Edgerton’s students and long-time photographic printer, collaborator, and friend.

Learn more about this exhibition. presented in celebration of the MIT Museum’s yearlong focus on TIME here:https://hubs.la/Q04jrZxV0

Images by Anna Olivella

What if time could drip instead of tick?

In this hands-on workshop, you’ll explore one of the earliest timekeeping devices: the water clock.

Start by learning how water clocks use flow rate to track time. Then, design and build your own system. As water moves drop by drop, you’ll test how small changes can reshape the way time is measured.

Along the way, we’ll explore how different cultures have tracked time and how physical systems turn the passage of time into something you can see and experience.

By the end of the workshop, you’ll leave with a working water clock to take home and a new understanding of how time can be measured not just in numbers, but in events.

📅June 6
⏰1-2:30 pm
🎟️15 for ages 14-18, $20 for ages 19+
Registration required.
The workshop is facilitated by instructors from Clever Rock Labs.

Congratulations to the Class of 2026!

At the MIT Museum, we welcome students to participate in our unique culture of problem solving and playful creativity throughout their learning journeys and beyond.

We are celebrating graduates Teagan Sullivan Mechanical and Ocean Engineering, 2026, David DePalma Graduate Student in Physics, MIT Kavli Institute for Astrophysics and Space Research both who shared their expertise with our community at the MIT Museum during their time on campus!

Wishing them and the many other recipients of the Brass Rats who will join together today to sing the School Song all the best!

With admission always free for the MIT Community – students, faculty, staff, alum with one guest, we can't wait to see you soon!

Split I Second takes visitors through the history of precision time measurement, offering a close-up look at the instruments developed to measure time as a part of our year-long exploration of TIME,

Housed in our Art + Science gallery, Split I Second features objects from our collection, combined with responses from the larger community draw from our TIME Open Call. The exhibition explores attempts to measure time using everything from sundials to quantum atomic clocks.

Learn more about the exhibition here: https://hubs.ly/Q04j33Hg0

Image: Anna Olivella

Is your teen on a quest for a summer full of hands-on exploration, design, and skill building in science, technology, engineering, arts, and mathematics?

The MIT Museum's bespoke STEAM Adventures Week is the perfect way to dive in and develop communication and collaboration skills. Participants aged 12-15 will work in teams to solve real-world problems, taking inspiration from the work of MIT researchers, exhibitions in the galleries, and MIT's campus.

Held in small groups, at the MIT Museum, with the MIT campus as inspiration, our STEAM Adventures Week is a great way to stay cool and build their skills over the summer.

Session I: 6/29/26 - 7/3/26
Session II: 7/20/26 - 7/24/26
Session III: 8/24/26-8/28/26

All session run from 9:30am –12:30pm and are held at the MIT Museum.

$550 per single student, $50 discount for siblings
Sessions are filling up quickly, so register here: https://hubs.la/Q04hVHDz0
Image by Chris McIntosh

Ready to rethink conversation?

Join us for a night of experiments, soundscapes, and unexpected fun at the MIT Museum.
Make your own conversation kit.
Mix your own audio story from real voices.
Explore the debate that helped shape Kendall Square.
Plus: Pierogis and beer.
In collaboration with realtalk@MIT

📆June 11
⏲️6–9pm
🎫18+ only

Adult Advance Purchase Ticket - $20 (Non-Refundable)
Same Day Ticket - $25
MIT ID holders - $10
Group Ticket - $15 (Minimum 10, Non-Refundable)
Please note that backpacks and large bags are not permitted.

Learn more and register here: https://hubs.la/Q04hc4mm0

Find out more about all of the rDNA events that we are presenting here: https://hubs.la/Q04hbv1t0