SONG OF THE PULSARS — Exterior top panel artwork for the IRVINE03 satellite.
The artwork designed by the United Catalysts team for the top panel of the IRVINE03 satellite pays tribute to the discovery of pulsars in 1967 by Dr. Jocelyn Bell Burnell.
3D mock up of IRVINE03 with Song of the Pulsars artwork
mock up of artwork in Adobe Illustrator with cutouts for top panel components.
DESCRIPTION
The focal point of the design is a diagram of the radio waves released by a neutron star, creating its rhythmic pulsar song. The graphic recording of this song, which Dr. Burnell used to make her discovery is shown on the left side of the panel, radiating out across the cosmos like a beacon. In the bottom left corner is a radio telescope from the Cambridge One-Mile telescope Array, used to catalog radio transmissions across the universe. Along the right side is a profile of the Interplanetary Scintillation Array, the telescope array that recorded the pulsar radio signal first observed by Bell Burnell.
In the background is Wandlebury Hill, part of the Gogmagog Downs near Cambridge, England. These ancient chalk hills have been inhabited since 3,000 B.C., and have been the site of ancient astronomical ceremonies, earth markings and burials. This sacred site represents our earliest observations of the heavens, and the continuum of humanity’s quest for knowledge about our place on earth and our place in the universe.
A quote by Dr. Bell Burnell, “Science is a quest for understanding”, stresses the importance of seeking not only facts about the world around us, but connections that guide our way forward. This quote is especially relevant to the mission of IRVINE03, as students will be using this satellite as a trainer for X-ray navigation (XNAV). The technique of using pulsars as navigational beacons will help enable the next generation of long-term space missions, and further our children’s understanding of the cosmos.
The artwork for Song of the Pulsars is rendered in temperature and UV radiation resistant materials: Kapton, aluminized mylar, Tedlar and metallic ink, to help it withstand the harsh conditions of space when it launches with NASA in Spring 2020.