National Museum of Nature and Science


The National Museum of Nature and Science is in the northeast corner of Ueno Park in Tokyo. The museum has exhibitions on pre-Meiji science in Japan. It is the venue of the taxidermied bodies of the legendary dogs Hachikō and Taro and Jiro. A life-size blue whale model and a steam locomotive are also on display outside.
WWW kahaku.go.jp𝕏 museum_kahakuFB NationalMuseumofNatureand...YT UCYvB5iWkIf6uMeA9fPS__swIG kahaku_nmns

History

Opened in 1877, it has had several names, including Ministry of Education Museum, Tokyo Museum, Tokyo Science Museum, the National Science Museum of Japan, and the National Museum of Nature and Science as of 2007. It was renovated in the 1990s and 2000s, and offers a wide variety of natural history exhibitions and interactive scientific experiences.
It was completed as the main building of the Tokyo Science Museum in September 1931 as part of the reconstruction project after the Great Kanto Earthquake in Neo-Renaissance style. Designed by Kenzo Akitani, an engineer of the Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology, Building Division. The building is the most visited museum in Japan, and looks like an airplane when viewed from above. In addition to the exhibition hall, it has facilities such as a dome for astronomical observation and an auditorium.
It is designed to withstand earthquakes of the Great Kanto Earthquake class, and it is said that there is no problem in light of the current Building Standards Act standards.
In 2021, the museum organized the Pokémon Fossil Museum, a travelling exhibition based on the Pokémon franchise, in collaboration with The Pokémon Company. The exhibition opened at the Mikasa City Museum in Mikasa, Hokkaido, Japan, on 4 July 2021, and remained there until 20 September. It has since been hosted by several other museums across Japan, including the National Museum of Nature and Science, which hosted it from 15 March to 19 June 2022. A virtual tour of the exhibit as it appeared in the museum was also made available online.

Materials in the collection

Number of materials

5,004,294 items.
Of these, approximately 14,000 are on permanent display. Others are stored and researched in the Tsukuba area.
  • Animal Research Department – 2,346,747 items
  • Department of Botany – 2,110,147 items
  • Geology Department – 353,270 items
  • Humanity Research Department – 163,315 items
  • Department of Science and Engineering – 38,815 items
About 100,000 items are newly collected each year.

Designated Cultural Properties

The following items in the collection are designated as national Important Cultural Properties.

National research facility

Museum research facility
Other National research facilities

Access