Osaka Aquarium Kaiyukan


The Osaka Aquarium Kaiyukan is an aquarium located in the ward of Minato in Osaka, Japan, near Osaka Bay. It is one of the largest public aquariums in the world, and is a member of the Japanese Association of Zoos and Aquariums.
The aquarium is about a five-minute walk from Osakako Station on the Osaka Municipal Subway Chūō Line, and is next to the Tempozan Ferris Wheel.

Exhibits

The walk-through aquarium displays marine life in several habitats comprising 27 tanks in 16 main exhibits with a total volume of 10,941 tons of water. The habitats are from the Ring of Fire area of the Pacific Ocean. The largest tank is deep and holds of water and a variety of fish including manta rays and 2 whale sharks.
The tanks used in the aquarium are made of of acrylic glass. The largest single pane measures six meters by five meters by thirty centimeters and weighs roughly 10 tons. At the thicknesses used, regular glass would be unwieldy and would not have the desired transparency.
The "New Interactive Area" that opened in 2013 allows visitors to see the animals up close and possibly touch them. In the "New Interactive Area", 3 zones are constructed, the Arctic zone, in which you see rounding ringed seals, Falkland Islands Zone, where you can see the rockhopper penguins, and the Maldives Zone, in which you can directly touch sharks and rays.
The themes, displays and their respective organisms at Kaiyukan are as follows;

Tunnel Tank

This is largest tank in the aquarium.
The Kaiyukan’s conceptual design, architecture, and exhibit design was led by Peter Chermayeff of Peter Chermayeff LLC while at Cambridge Seven Associates.