Transforming Advanced Nanoscience Data into Interactive Art

Credit: Brookhaven National Laboratory

Multimedia artist Melissa Clarke (center) made more than a dozen 3-D printed glass-like sculptures based on nanoscience data collected by scientists at Brookhaven Lab's Center for Functional Nanomaterials (CFN) and National Synchrotron Light Source II, including CFN physicist Kevin Yager (right). For the virtual reality (VR) component of the project, viewers can walk through and interact with the sculptures by wearing a VR headset. During the immersive experience, different sonifications created by Margaret Schedel (left)—a professor of computer music at Stony Brook University—play as the user performs various actions.

« Transforming Advanced Nanoscience Data into Interactive Art

$Different materials produce vastly different corresponding sounds. From top to bottom: a commercial plastic, a misaligned sample (beam missed the sample), and a composite of carbon nanotubes dispersed in an elastic polymer. For example, the commercial plastic has many striations (scattering rings, which arise from the diffraction of x-rays from the sample's internal structure) because of its semi-crystalline packing, leading to several distinct tones over time.$

Credit: Proceedings of the 18th International Conference on Auditory Display paper: "Hearing Nano-Structures: A Case Study in Timbral Sonification"

Different materials produce vastly different corresponding sounds. From top to bottom: a commercial plastic, a misaligned sample (beam missed the sample), and a composite of carbon nanotubes dispersed in an elastic polymer. For example, the commercial plastic has many striations (scattering rings, which arise from the diffraction of x-rays from the sample's internal structure) because of its semi-crystalline packing, leading to several distinct tones over time.

« Transforming Advanced Nanoscience Data into Interactive Art

Credit: Brookhaven National Laboratory

Melissa Clarke holds a nanostar (left) and DNA octahedron (right) sculpture that she 3-D printed based on data collected through electron tomography with a transmission electron microscope. In electron tomography, a beam of electrons is passed through a sample at different angles to generate 3-D structural information.

« Transforming Advanced Nanoscience Data into Interactive Art

Credit: Brookhaven National Laboratory

Scientists can generate 3-D height maps of the features on a sample surface at atomic resolution through scanning probe microscopy. An ultrasharp mechanical probe (tip) is brought very close to the surface of interest, and the local interaction of this tip with the surface is measured as the tip is scanned back and forth.

« Transforming Advanced Nanoscience Data into Interactive Art

Credit: Stony Brook University (left); Brookhaven National Laboratory (right)

(Left) The 3-D printed data sculptures on display at the U.S. Library of Congress in Washington, DC. (Right) An attendee of the CFN 10-year anniversary event tries out the VR experience.

« Transforming Advanced Nanoscience Data into Interactive Art

Credit: Melissa Clarke

The second VR piece has a new look and improved user experience that gives users more control over what parts of the data they see and interact with. Users can pick up the sculptures and rotate them to see the view from different angles.

« Transforming Advanced Nanoscience Data into Interactive Art

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