This device creates rainbows of sound

3-D printing: The creation of a three-dimensional object with a machine that follows instructions from a computer program. The computer tells the printer where to lay down successive layers of some raw material, which can be plastic, metals, food or even living cells. This type of printing is also called additive manufacturing.

acoustic: Having to do with sound or hearing.

acoustics: The science of sound.

computer model: A program that runs on a computer that creates a model, or simulation, of a real-world feature, phenomenon or event.

inverse: Something that is the opposite or reverse of another thing, or that moves in the opposite direction to something.

model: A simulation of a real-world event (usually using a computer) that has been developed to predict one or more likely outcomes. Or an individual that is meant to display how something would work in or look on others.

physicist: A scientist who studies the nature and properties of matter and energy.

prototype: A first or early model of some device, system or product that still needs to be perfected.

rainbow: An arc of color displayed across the sky during or just after a rain. It’s caused when water droplets in the atmosphere bend (or diffract) white sunlight into a number of its component hues: usually red, orange, yellow, green, blue, indigo and violet.

random: Something that occurs haphazardly or without reason, based on no intention or purpose. Or an adjective that describes some thing that found itself selected for no particular reason, or even chaotically.

sound wave: A wave that transmits sound. Sound waves have alternating swaths of high and low pressure.

wavelength: The distance between one peak and the next in a series of waves, or the distance between one trough and the next. It’s also one of the “yardsticks” used to measure radiation. Visible light — which, like all electromagnetic radiation, travels in waves — includes wavelengths between about 380 nanometers (violet) and about 740 nanometers (red). Radiation with wavelengths shorter than visible light includes gamma rays, X-rays and ultraviolet light. Longer-wavelength radiation includes infrared light, microwaves and radio waves.