On The Ice: Weather Station

Battle extreme weather conditions in Antarctica while repairing a network of broken weather stations. This VR experience is based on the real world adventures of polar researchers who build and maintain weather stations in Antarctica in order to collect valuable meteorological data.

Bloom: The Saga of the Fertilizer Economy

In Bloom, you’ll create trade networks and enact policies that keep farmers in business, while stopping excess manure from entering local lakes and rivers. Made with UW-Madison’s Scalable Systems Lab (Directed by Victor Zavala) with funding from the Environmental Protection Agency.

Headlines and High Water

In Headlines and High Water, players take on the role of a young journalist in the fictional town of Twin Lakes, where the annual Cherry Festival is thrown into chaos by a catastrophic flood. The player is tasked with interviewing locals and writing stories to keep the town informed—all while staying safe during the town’s worst flood of the century.

Wake: Tales from the Aqualab

Wake: Tales from the Aqualab is a 6th-9th grade science game that challenges students with engaging, authentic missions in a variety of ocean-based ecosystems. In Wake, students take on the role of a scientist studying ocean ecosystems, traveling to different ocean research sites to answer questions and solve problems. As they progress at their own pace, players are guided to gradually take on more complex science challenges.

Legend of the Lost Emerald

Take on the role of a maritime archaeologist uncovering shipwrecks in the Great Lakes! In this historical inquiry game, players use GPS coordinates, go out on dives, take underwater photos, and use artifacts to solve the mystery of each shipwreck.

Partners: PBS Wisconsin, Wisconsin Sea Grant

Waddle: A Penguin's Tale

Our in-progress Penguins VR Project will allow players to experience life as a penguin in Cape Royds, Antarctica! We’re thrilled to work with penguin researcher Jean Pennycook to create a fun, playful experience that introduces people to her NSF-funded work.

Partners: NSF, Wisconsin Institute for Discovery, Wisconsin IceCube Particle Astrophysics Center

Discover IceCube

The IceCube Virtual Reality experience puts you in the role of an astrophysicist. Journey deep into space to track down the source of a neutrino detected by the IceCube observatory in Antarctica. Play at the Wisconsin Institute for Discovery in Madison, WI, or download for your own VR device.

Partners: NSF, Wisconsin Institute for Discovery, Wisconsin IceCube Particle Astrophysics Center

Lost at the Forever Mine

This space adventure brings mathematical modeling straight to the classroom. To escape an abandoned planet, players set up equations, input data, work with graphs, and use models as a tool to make decisions.

Partners: UW-MRSEC

Lakeland

This award-winning game teaches complex systems! Players create their own town, manage resources, and learn about the relationship between dairy farming, soil nutrition, and lake pollution.

Partners: UW-Madison Scalable Systems Lab

Jo Wilder and the Capitol Case

This award-winning game turns kids into history detectives! In this point-and-click adventure, players use the methods of real historians to uncover the story behind each mystery artifact.

Partners: PBS Wisconsin, Wisconsin Historical Society

Thermolab

Explore the world of thermodynamics by conducting experiments using a water-based piston-cylinder apparatus. The simulation allows users to control a collection of tools: a bunsen burner, cooling coils, weights, stops, and environmental controls, to develop an intuitive understanding of thermodynamic processes.

Partners: UW-Madison School of Engineering

Atom Touch

This molecular simulation app allows players to explore the abstract principles of thermodynamics and molecular dynamics in a tactile, exploratory way.

Partners: UW-MRSEC

Plate Tectonics

This vector field simulator allows kids to explore how magma flow creates forces that move the Earth’s tectonic plates. The game introduces kids to phenomena like volcanoes, earthquakes, and the formation of trenches.

Partners: BrainPOP

Rock Cycle Simulation

Learn about how rocks and minerals form from one another! Players choose transitional events, like a volcanic eruption or the formation of volcanic rock, and explore how rocks and minerals move through the world.

Partners: BrainPOP

Carbon Cycle Simulation

Learn how carbon moves through the ecosystem! In this simulator, players trigger events—like the burning of fossil fuel—and watch how the carbon moves among the air, ocean, rocks, and living things.

Partners: BrainPOP

Water Cycle Simulation

Learn about the water cycle! This simulator allows players to trigger events and trace how water moves through the atmosphere, bodies of water, living things, and more.

Partners: BrainPOP

Earth’s Force Fields

In this 2-in-1 simulator, players learn how bodies in the vicinity of Earth are affected by the fields created by the Earth itself. Play in Magnetism Mode to explore how ions move into the magnetic field of the Earth, and play in Gravity Mode to learn about how objects fall towards Earth or get pulled into orbit.

Partners: BrainPOP

Ocean and Air Currents

This simulation uses a map to show how physical matter is moved around by ocean and air currents. Players can move between different layers of the map, measure temperatures, follow currents through the ocean, and place a balloon or a ship in a bottle in the current to see how it moves.

Partners: BrainPOP

Energy in Food Webs

This game shows how energy from the sun and from geologic thermal processes flows through living things. Use nodes and arrows to trigger the movement of energy through food webs, from the sun to plants to herbivores, all the way up to apex predators, and then back to the soil again.

Partners: BrainPOP

Plant Growth

This simulation teaches the life cycle of plants! Set variables, choose actions (like “Send in bees” or “Windy weather”) and then launch the simulation. Watch your plant move from a tiny seed to a flowering plant, and then start again with a new seed—if it survives that long.

Partners: BrainPOP

Living Cell

Use this simulation to teach cellular processes! Players can trigger metabolic events in three types of cells: cobra venom glands, Venus fly traps, and E. Coli. Set your conditions, launch the simulation, and watch as processes like cellular respiration and protein production play out.

Partners: BrainPOP

Crystal Cave

This simple puzzle game introduces kids to crystals! Players try their hand at arranging molecules with different shapes and properties into an ordered, stable configuration.

Partners: UW-MRSEC, Wisconsin DPI

Carbon Cycle Game

Learn how carbon moves through the world! In this board-game style game, players use Action cards, like Photosynthesis and Soil Respiration, to convert carbon from one form to another.

Partners: Wisconsin DPI, Wisconsin Virtual Schools

Water Cycle Game

Learn how water moves through the world! In this board-game style game, players use Action cards, like Condensation and Evaporation, to convert water from one form to another.

Partners: Wisconsin DPI, Wisconsin Virtual Schools

Nitrogen Cycle Game

Learn how nitrogen moves through the world! In this board-game style game, players use Action cards, like Plant Death and Plant Assimilation, to convert nitrogen atoms from one form to another.

Partners: Wisconsin DPI, Wisconsin Virtual Schools

Magnet Hunt

In this introduction to magnetism, players use magnetic fields and iron filings to find magnets hidden in the sand. The game covers topics like magnetic forces, poles, and magnetic fields.

Partners: Wisconsin DPI, Wisconsin Virtual Schools

Hot Air Balloon

Time to fly! In this game, players control the altitude of a hot air balloon by heating the balloon or releasing air with the air flap. Players learn about buoyancy, volume, and air pressure.

Partners: Wisconsin DPI, Wisconsin Virtual Schools

Earthquake!

This playful simulation uses shockwaves and tin-can towns to introduce players to how scientists study earthquakes! Players learn about topics like S and P waves, epicenters, and triangulation.

Partners: Wisconsin DPI, Wisconsin Virtual Schools

Wave Combinator

This game invites kids to explore how waves interact. Kids can use the Wave Combinator to learn about concepts like amplitude, offset, wavelength, and frequency.

Partners: Wisconsin DPI, Wisconsin Virtual Schools

Antibiotic Resistance

In this playful introduction to the world of bacteria, players get a visual representation of reproduction, mutation, and antibiotic resistance.

Partners: Wisconsin DPI, Wisconsin Virtual Schools

Wind Simulator

In this game, a ruined tower-building contest leads to a crash course on the science of wind. Players learn about wind direction, wind speed, pressure systems, and how scientists use wind to predict weather.

Partners: Wisconsin DPI, Wisconsin Virtual Schools