Posts: 44191 From: Houston, TX Registered: Nov 1999
posted 07-07-2020 01:05 PM
The Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA) has been experimenting with lights mounted on a spiral top as part of its cultural payloads program since 2009.
The project's precursor mission "Spiral Top", which was performed on April 30, 2009, was designed to produce light arts using a spinning top that has arms illuminating with LED point light sources. "Auroral Oval Spiral Top" was the second version and designed to produce aurora-like luminescence traces using a spinning top with both linear and point light sources. In microgravity, the center of gravity of the spinning top continuously and randomly moves while it is spinning. Using the characteristics of the top in microgravity, the project tries to produce various light arts using its unexpected movements/spins, by changing attaching locations of its arms and weights.
NASA recently released photos from the experiment taken in 2014.
View of light spirals from the Education Payload Observation (JAXA-EPO) experiment Spiral Top which aims to record the motion of a spinning top onboard the International Space Station (ISS). The photo was taken in the JAXA Experiment Module (JEM) Pressurized Module (JPM) aboard the International Space Station (ISS).