Echinodermania
Toroidal Forms

George W. Hart

I like echinoderms, and these are toroidal sculptures inspired by their forms. They are not models of actual species, but more like some kind of parallel universe evolution of maniacal echinoderms. This family is toroidal in form, with the above example making five twists in its cycle. All are made by selective laser sintering of nylon, on an SLS machine, then I dyed them.

It can be hard to understand the form from a photo, so this computer rendering might help.
Notice that some of the finer details of the design could not be fabricated.

This top view of the same form shows its five-fold structure.

This second example is related, but makes seven twists.

Again, a computer rendering shows some details of the design more clearly.

And a top view shows the seven-fold structure of this one.

There is a paper describing the mathematics here.
There is a picture showing the original white color and an .stl file for you to make your own here.