California Academy of Sciences/Steinhart Aquarium456

Topped with a living roof, the newly rebuilt California Academy of Sciences is home to an aquarium, planetarium, and natural history museum.

The aquarium, with an estimated 38,000 live animals, is one of the most biodiverse and interactive aquariums in the world. It features the world's deepest living coral reef tank, in which guests can see thousands of reef fish darting through a technicolor forest of coral, alongside sharks and rays cruising through a mangrove lagoon.

The Academy is also home to a four-story living rainforest dome, where visitors can explore the ecosystems of Borneo, Madagascar, Costa Rica, and the flooded Amazon. A spiraling ramp circles up through rainforest and exhibit galleries, showcasing each ecosystem along the way. From the top of the dome, visitors descend through the rainforest in a glass elevator, and plunge into the flooded Amazon, where a see-through tunnel allows visitors to walk beneath the Amazonian river fish that swim overhead.

The Academy's natural history exhibits look not only at the history of life on Earth, but also its future. In the Islands of Evolution exhibit, visitors see the remote islands of Madagascar and the Galapagos through the eyes of Academy scientists, and learn how islands function as laboratories for evolution.

In the west gallery, an exhibit called Altered State: Climate Change in California uses California as a case study to explore the science of climate change, the effects we might expect to see in our own backyard, and the steps that can be taken to mitigate those dramatic changes. Visitors can also see how the Academy's new building incorporates green technologies to improve its energy efficiency and reduce its impact on the environment.

In the planetarium, visitors leave Planet Earth behind as a live presenter guides them on a tour of the solar system and beyond, using current data from NASA to produce the most accurate and interactive digital Universe ever created.

Long-time favorites including African Hall, the alligator-filled Swamp, and the Foucault pendulum return in the newly rebuilt Academy.

Penguin feedings, coral reef dives, and other programs take place every day. More details are available on the center's website.