3D-printed cube in Singapore’s contribution to the Moon-to-Moon Art Gallery, Singapore News & Top Stories

Singapore-A complexly designed 3D-printed cube that represents the fusion of art and science is one of the Republic’s contributions to the exhibition that mankind sends to the Moon.

The cube named Structure & Reflectance is smaller than a standard dice, 0.98 cm on each side, and each of the four sides represents a unique set of patterns.

This work is one of 100 artworks selected by the Netherlands-based Moon Gallery Foundation as the first permanent extraterrestrial art gallery to land on the Moon by 2025.

The 1 cm deep 10 cm x 10 cm tray-shaped art gallery will board a test flight to the International Space Station (the last frontier of human habitat in space) via the NG-17. Rocket as part of the Northrop Grumman Cygnus supply mission in February 2022.

On the return trip, Moon Gallery will be part of the NanoLab technical payload, a module for space research experiments.

The 3D-printed cube was a collaboration between local artist and designer Lakshmi Mohambab and Assistant Professor Matteo Seita of the Faculty of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering, Nanyang Technological University.

Lakshmi also submitted another cube of metallic orange, known as the interaction cube, to the Moon Gallery.

This project was supported by the National Additive Manufacturing Innovation Cluster (Namic). The cluster connected Lakshmi with different scientists from different organizations to help create her designs.

Dr. Hochausin, co-founder and managing director of Namic, said: Lakshmi’s 3D-printed cube is the only Singaporean of the few selected from the global community, showing a unique perspective through the fusion of art and technology. We are proud to have played a small role in supporting her in this “Moonshot” initiative. “

The patterns on each side of both cubes were recreated from Lakshmi’s paintings, which revolve around the notions of human unity, diversity and complexity, she told The Straits Times in an exclusive interview. ..

“Part of the complexity lies in the duality of the people-there are external façades that we perceive about each other, but there are parts of ourselves that we haven’t revealed,” she said.

“In a sense, the quality of the moon is the same. Until space travel was possible, the far side of the moon was always facing the other side of the earth and we couldn’t see it.”

Dr. Seita, a faculty member of NTU’s Faculty of Materials Science and Engineering, said finding a way to use materials to convey these ideas is an important task in creating 3D-printed cubes.

“But we soon realized that there were clear similarities between materials and people, both of which are very complex and mostly made up of hidden structures.” He said.

For example, metals are made up of small crystals with different atomic lattice orientations and are only visible to the naked eye when the metal is treated with a chemical.

These microcrystals can take on different shapes, sizes, and orientations on different metal objects, depending on the process used to make them, Dr. Seita said.

“By using additive manufacturing (also known as 3D printing), we have very fine control over these functions, the structure of the metal,” he added.

Each patterned surface of a cube made of stainless steel consists of two different crystals in different orientations and a shape that mimics Lakshmi’s artwork.

The pattern only appears after the metal cube has been placed in acid. During this treatment, either crystal corrodes differently, creating a visual contrast on the surface of the surface of the cube, Dr. Seita said.

Seen from a particular angle in colored light, these patterns come alive.

“This is a perspective idea. A cube can capture the different colors displayed on the cube, much like you see things with different colored lenses,” Lakshmi said. ..

The creation of the cube is also a tribute to the advancement of space travel-based on the idea that the former invisible part of the Moon is now illuminated by humanity, Dr. Seita said.

By creating small and complex cubes, potential applications of 3D printing technology have also been demonstrated.

“Now we can create objects with both complex shapes and structures, which no other manufacturing process can do,” says Dr. Seita.

With these features, you can manufacture parts with much less material. This makes it lighter, more durable and stronger than when manufactured by traditional methods.

He added that this state-of-the-art technology will increase the opportunities for 3D printing in aerospace and aircraft manufacturing in the future.