HYOURAKU — Cryosphere
Touch and melt Earth's ice
Free · Designed for iPad. Not verified for macOS.
Six modules on Earth's ice: glaciers, ice-albedo, ice cores, permafrost, snow crystals and sea level. Move the sliders to see glaciers retreat and sea ice tip over.
HYOURAKU is a visual education app for learning the science of Earth's ice — glaciology, sea ice, and paleoclimate — by watching and interacting with beautiful simulations.
As the cryosphere module of the "Raku" series, it sits next to KAIRAKU (oceanography) and connects naturally through sea ice, thermohaline circulation, and sea-level rise. It covers six topics from high-school earth science up to introductory glaciology and climatology.
[Six Modules]
- Glacier Dynamics
See how a glacier "flows even though it is solid," drawn as a valley cross-section. Move the temperature and accumulation (snowfall) sliders to shift the equilibrium-line altitude (ELA); the ratio of accumulation to ablation zones sets the mass balance. A positive balance advances the terminus, a negative one retreats it — a hands-on way to understand why so many mountain glaciers are retreating under warming.
- Ice-Albedo Feedback
White sea ice reflects most incoming sunlight, while dark ocean absorbs it. Seen from above the Arctic, experience the positive feedback "less ice -> lower albedo -> more absorbed heat -> even less ice." Push the external forcing past a threshold and the runaway collapses the ice abruptly (tipping); restoring the forcing does not easily bring it back (hysteresis).
- Ice Core / Paleoclimate
Each layer of an ice core traps the air of its time as bubbles. Drag the core up and down to travel into the past and read each layer's bubble CO₂ and the temperature reconstructed from isotopes. Glacials had low CO₂ and were cold; interglacials had high CO₂ and were warm — explore hundreds of thousands of years of climate paced by Milankovitch cycles.
- Permafrost
As it warms, the active layer deepens and thawing permafrost releases CO₂ and methane via microbes — a positive carbon feedback that drives further warming, shown in a soil cross-section.
- Snow Crystals (Nakaya diagram)
A snow crystal's shape is set by the cloud's temperature and supersaturation. Following Ukichiro Nakaya's diagram, plates, columns, needles, and dendrites are drawn in beautiful six-fold symmetry.
- Sea Level Rise
Melt sliders for Greenland, Antarctica, and mountain glaciers raise the sea and flood a coastal city in cross-section. The theme connects to thermohaline circulation and sea-level rise in KAIRAKU.
[Features]
- Principle / explanation sheet in every module
- A timely theme tied directly to climate change
- 9 languages (Japanese, English, Chinese Simplified/Traditional, Spanish, Portuguese (BR), Korean, German, French)
- A one-line "how to try" guide on every simulation screen
- Play / pause button with a clear label
- Sea Level Rise: a zoomed tide gauge (cm scale) makes even the small contribution of mountain glaciers (about 0.4 m at most) visible
- Supports landscape, large text sizes, and VoiceOver
- About screen with links to the privacy policy and support
- Simulations run at the same speed on any display refresh rate
- Free to use with every feature unlocked (banner ads only; no in-app purchases or subscriptions)
- Polar, realistic visuals on a dark theme
- Intuitive, beautiful UI
[Great for]
- Students of earth science, glaciology, or climatology
- Anyone who wants an intuitive grasp of glaciers, sea ice, and paleoclimate
- Teachers looking for classroom material
- Anyone who wants to properly understand the news on climate change, glacier retreat, and shrinking Arctic sea ice
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The developer, Fuji Bit Inc., indicated that the app’s privacy practices may include handling of data as described below. For more information, see the developer’s privacy policy .
Data Used to Track You
The following data may be used to track you across apps and websites owned by other companies:
- Identifiers
Data Linked to You
The following data may be collected and linked to your identity:
- Location
- Identifiers
- Usage Data
- Diagnostics
- Other Data
Data Not Linked to You
The following data may be collected but it is not linked to your identity:
- Identifiers
Accessibility
The developer has not yet indicated which accessibility features this app supports. Learn More
Information
- Seller
- Fuji Bit Inc.
- Size
- 26.4 MB
- Category
- Education
- Compatibility
Requires iOS 15.0 or later.
- iPhone
Requires iOS 15.0 or later. - iPad
Requires iPadOS 15.0 or later. - iPod touch
Requires iOS 15.0 or later. - Mac
Requires macOS 12.0 or later and a Mac with Apple M1 chip or later. - Apple Vision
Requires visionOS 1.0 or later.
- iPhone
- Languages
English and 8 more
- English, French, German, Japanese, Korean, Portuguese, Simplified Chinese, Spanish, Traditional Chinese
- Age Rating
4+
- 4+
- Contains
Advertising
- Copyright
- © 2026 Fuji Bit