The Aquarium of Rhodes is a research centre, aquarium and

museum A museum ( ; plural museums or, rarely, musea) is a building or institution that cares for and displays a collection of artifacts and other objects of artistic, cultural, historical, or scientific importance. Many public museums make thes ...

Rhodes Rhodes (; el, Ρόδος , translit=Ródos ) is the largest and the historical capital of the Dodecanese islands of Greece. Administratively, the island forms a separate municipality within the Rhodes regional unit, which is part of the S ...

Greece Greece,, or , romanized: ', officially the Hellenic Republic, is a country in Southeast Europe. It is situated on the southern tip of the Balkans, and is located at the crossroads of Europe, Asia, and Africa. Greece shares land borders ...

. It was built in the 1930s, when the island was under the Italian rule and is currently administered by the National Centre of Marine Research.

History

The building, an

Art deco Art Deco, short for the French ''Arts Décoratifs'', and sometimes just called Deco, is a style of visual arts, architecture, and product design, that first appeared in France in the 1910s (just before World War I), and flourished in the Unite ...

design by the Italian architect , was constructed between 1934 and 1935. When it first started operations in 1937, it was named the Reale Istituto di Ricerce Biologiche di Rodi (Royal Biological Research Institute of Rhodes). Research here included the hydrology, sponges, and fisheries of the Aegean. When the island was handed back to Greece in 1945, the facility was operated as part of the "Hellenic Hydrobiological Institute". Since 1963 it has been known as the "Hydrobiological Station of Rhodes", and is administered by the National Centre of Marine Research. An exhibition area was added to the north side of the building in 1971–72.

Layout

The aquarium is in the basement of the building, and is a corridor designed to look like an underwater cave. The tanks along each side of the corridor are filled with approximately of filtered seawater, providing a natural environment for the residents. The displays include sea anemones and plants, octopuses, sea urchins,

coral Corals are marine invertebrates within the class Anthozoa of the phylum Cnidaria. They typically form compact colonies of many identical individual polyps. Coral species include the important reef builders that inhabit tropical oceans and ...

s, bivalves, crabs, lobsters,

sea turtle Sea turtles (superfamily Chelonioidea), sometimes called marine turtles, are reptiles of the order Testudines and of the suborder Cryptodira. The seven existing species of sea turtles are the flatback, green, hawksbill, leatherback, loggerhe ...

dolphin A dolphin is an aquatic mammal within the infraorder Cetacea. Dolphin species belong to the families Delphinidae (the oceanic dolphins), Platanistidae (the Indian river dolphins), Iniidae (the New World river dolphins), Pontoporiidae (the ...

seal Seal may refer to any of the following: Common uses * Pinniped, a diverse group of semi-aquatic marine mammals, many of which are commonly called seals, particularly: ** Earless seal, or "true seal" ** Fur seal * Seal (emblem), a device to imp ...

mollusk Mollusca is the second-largest phylum of invertebrate animals after the Arthropoda, the members of which are known as molluscs or mollusks (). Around 85,000 extant species of molluscs are recognized. The number of fossil species is e ...

shark Sharks are a group of elasmobranch fish characterized by a cartilaginous skeleton, five to seven gill slits on the sides of the head, and pectoral fins that are not fused to the head. Modern sharks are classified within the clade Selachi ...

s, and many other fish. There is a separate holding facility for incoming specimens and organisms that need special handling, where the facility also cares for sea turtles and seals that have been injured nearby.

References

External links

* * {{Authority control Aquaria in Greece Buildings and structures in Rhodes (city) Museums in Rhodes Natural history museums in Greece Dodecanese under Italian rule Italian fascist architecture