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"Star Wars: Where Science Meets Imagination," opens on Thursday is the first public display of props and costumes from all six films in the Star Wars series, including a replica cockpit of Han Solo's asteroid-battered Millennium Falcon is .

The $5 million exhibit goes beyond entertainment and turns "Star Wars" into a educational tool for science and technology, fields in which U.S. dominance faces a challenge from a new generation of engineers in Asia.

Lucas's LucasFilm Ltd. and Boston's Museum of Science to give some scientific basis to the fantasy of the films. Luke Skywalker's gravity-defying "Landspeeder" appears on stage in original form -- accompanied by lessons in magnetic levitation and the powerful electromagnets that can hurtle high-speed "maglev" trains at speeds of up to 310 mph.

Rows of "Star Wars" androids and Anakin Skywalker's prosthetic right hand from Episode III -- before his transformation into Darth Vader -- are used to explain advances in robotic technology and modern medical prosthetics.

The cockpit of the Millennium Falcon, built to a blueprint provided by Lucas, is transformed into a high-tech planetarium with a recorded voice of Anthony Daniels, who played C-3PO, explaining the stars and how modern scientists view them.