March 25--The visual centerpiece of the Museum of Science and Industry's new temporary exhibit, "Materials Science," is an atom probe field ion microscope, a Smart Car-sized device that looks so important you wonder how it can afford to be in a museum. It was used to determine the type and location of atoms in a material, and it looks the part: This is what you'd cast as "menacing scientific device" in your spy thriller. Surrounding it, in the two lower-level galleries that most recently held the treasures-from-the-storerooms show "80 at 80," are more prosaic, but nonetheless engaging, discussions of the development of the field that works with plastic, ceramics and metals, as well as silicon, carbon and magnets. Did you know concrete is a ceramic?
Through January 2016 at the Museum of Science and Industry, 5700 S. Lake Shore Drive; included in general admission ($18); 773-684-1414 and msichicago.org
