The 3D Printed Universe
We offer two kinds of 3D printable objects in this section. The first is a set of specially-developed fully 3D models, and the second is a set of tactile plates that are developed as relief maps of images to help make the 2D data more experiential.
RCW 36 is a region of star formation about 2,900 light-years from Earth. This tactile plate depicts RCW 36 as a physical relief map based on the intensity of X-ray data captured by Chandra and infrared data from Herschel. The file for this plate can be downloaded and 3D-printed for learners to touch.
The plate depicts a large hot gas cloud flecked with dots, where the dots are new stars, a major source of the region’s hot gas. At our lower left and upper right are two large cavities, or voids, carved out of the gas. In the center of the image is a ring of gas wrapping around the central star cluster.
3D Print Credit: NASA/CXC/A. Jubett, using software by Tactile Universe/N. Bonne & C. Krawczyk & Blender
V404 Cygni is a binary system where a stellar-mass black hole is in orbit with a “normal” star. This tactile plate depicts V404 Cygni as a physical relief map based on the intensity of X-ray data captured by Chandra. The file for this plate can be downloaded and 3D-printed for learners to touch.
At the very center of the V404 system is a black hole (which cannot be felt as it is not visible) surrounded by material that has produced bursts of radiation, or light. These bursts expand outward in concentric rings which reflect off gas and dust clouds. The rings of radiation are grainy and blurred in texture, like curved tire marks left in wet snow. The smallest ring, closest to the center, is tightest and brightest. The largest ring, furthest from the core, is most faint and appears to have dissipated.
Download the V404 Cygni Plate STL file
3D Print Credit: NASA/CXC/A. Jubett, using software by Tactile Universe/N. Bonne & C. Krawczyk & Blender
This tactile plate depicts a system of galaxy clusters known as Abell 98, as a physical relief map based on the intensity of X-ray data captured by Chandra and optical data from the WIYN telescope. The file for this plate can be downloaded and 3D-printed for learners to touch.
The plate of Abell 98, about 1.4 billion light years from Earth, depicts little specks — mostly galaxies. Near the top and bottom of the plate are clouds of gas, each with a cluster of galaxies at its core. The two galaxy clusters are in the early stages of a collision. Upon close inspection, a faint corridor of gas can be found bridging the space between the clusters. Scientists have proposed that this X-ray bridge between the clusters contains some of the unaccounted-for mass in the universe. Hidden in this bridge are gigantic strands, or filaments, of hot gas.
3D Print Credit: NASA/CXC/A. Jubett, using software by Tactile Universe/N. Bonne & C. Krawczyk & Blender
This tactile plate depicts a star, Zeta Ophiuchi as a physical relief map based on the intensity of the X-ray data captured by Chandra and the infrared data captured by Spitzer. The file for this plate can be downloaded and 3D-printed for learners to touch.
The star Zeta Ophiuchi, which is about 20 times more massive than our Sun, is the main source located at the center of the image. The shockwave appears to the left of the star, with a curve like an archer's bow. Astronomers believe that this shockwave was formed by matter blowing away from Zeta Ophiuchi's surface and slamming into gas in its path, as the star moves from right to left. There are thinner, fainter clouds that streak the entire plate. These faint clouds, felt as thin ridges, represent the gas in the path of the star's shockwave. In the background, small specks, or stars, dot the blankness of space.
3D Print Credit: NASA/CXC/A. Jubett, using software by Tactile Universe/N. Bonne & C. Krawczyk & Blender
This tactile plate depicts SNR 0519-69.0, the remnant of a supernova, as a physical relief map based on the intensity of the X-ray data captured by Chandra. The file for this plate can be downloaded and 3D-printed for learners to touch.
On the plate, a mottled blob floats in a dark sky. The blob is the remnant of the supernova, the debris from an exploded white dwarf star. This star exploded several hundred years ago, within Earth's timeframe. Across the surface of the supernova remnant, bulges in the shape are like the lines between the rounded plates on a turtle's shell.
3D Print Credit: NASA/CXC/A. Jubett, using software by Tactile Universe/N. Bonne & C. Krawczyk & Blender
This tactile plate depicts supernova remnant G292, as a physical relief map based on the intensity of the X-ray data captured by Chandra. The file for this plate can be downloaded and 3D-printed for learners to touch.
The G292.0+1.8 supernova remnant contains a pulsar moving at over a million miles per hour, as marked in the Chandra image. Pulsars are rapidly spinning neutron stars that can form when massive stars run out of fuel, collapse, and explode. Sometimes these explosions produce a “kick,” which sent this pulsar.
3D Print Credit: NASA/CXC/A. Jubett, using software by Tactile Universe/N. Bonne & C. Krawczyk & Blender
This tactile plate depicts bright glowing quasar H1821+643 powered by a supermassive black hole, as a physical relief map based on the intensity of the X-ray data captured by Chandra. The file for this plate can be downloaded and 3D-printed for learners to touch.
The quasar can be felt at the center of the image and sits in the middle of a hazy cloud. This cloud is hot gas in the cluster of galaxies where the quasar resides, as observed by NASA’s Chandra X-ray Observatory.
3D Print Credit: NASA/CXC/A. Jubett, using software by Tactile Universe/N. Bonne & C. Krawczyk & Blender
Milky Way
This tactile plate depicts our Milky Way galaxy as a physical relief map based on the intensity of the data captured in optical light. Sagittarius A* is located at the core of the galaxy in the center of the plate. The file for this plate can be downloaded and 3D-printed for learners to touch.
3D Print Credit: NASA/CXC/A. Jubett, K.Arcand et al., using software by Tactile Universe/N. Bonne & C. Krawczyk & Blender; Photo Credit: ESO/S. Brunier
This tactile plate depicts the center of the Milky Way at very close proximity to the central supermassive black hole, Sagittarius A*, as a physical relief map based on the intensity of the radio data captured by the Event Horizon Telescope (EHT). The file for this plate can be downloaded and 3D-printed for learners to touch.
This image showcases Sagittarius A*, the supermassive black hole at the heart of our Milky Way galaxy. Gas in a glowing ring surrounds the black hole’s “event horizon”, a boundary from which nothing can escape. The ring features three bright spots and a fuzzy aura, set against a solid background. The ring is created by light bending in the intense gravity around the black hole at the center, which has a mass some 4 million times greater than that of our Sun.
3D Print Credit: NASA/CXC/A. Jubett, K.Arcand et al., using software by Tactile Universe/N. Bonne & C. Krawczyk & Blender; Photo Credit: ESO/S. Brunier
This tactile plate depicts a larger area surrounding the Milky Way’s central supermassive black hole, Sagittarius A*, as a physical relief map based on the intensity of the X-ray data captured by NASA’s Chandra X-ray Observatory. Sagittarius A*, near the center, is marked with an arrow. The file for this plate can be downloaded and 3D-printed for learners to touch.
3D Print Credit: NASA/CXC/A. Jubett, K.Arcand et al., using software by Tactile Universe/N. Bonne & C. Krawczyk & Blender; Photo Credit: NASA/CXC/UCLA/Z.Li et al.
This tactile plate depicts NGC 4424, a spiral galaxy, as a physical relief map based on the intensity of the X-ray data captured by Chandra and the optical data captured by Hubble. The file for this plate can be downloaded and 3D-printed for learners to touch.
The spiral galaxy is observed from the side, making the spiral structure less evident, like observing a frisbee only from the side. The center of this galaxy is expected to host a large black hole estimated to contain a mass between about 60,000 and 100,000 Suns. There are also likely to be millions of stellar-mass black holes, which contain between about 5 and 30 solar masses, spread throughout the galaxy.
3D Print Credit: NASA/CXC/A. Jubett, using software by Tactile Universe/N. Bonne & C. Krawczyk & Blender
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Additional support from NASA's Universe of Learning (UoL). UoL materials are based upon work supported by NASA under award number NNX16AC65A to the Space
Telescope Science Institute, working in partnership with Caltech/IPAC, Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory.