A three-dimensional, modular origami fractal has taken form for the first time in the history of the world—and perhaps the universe—at the USC Libraries in Los Angeles.

Led by the libraries’ Discovery Fellow Margaret Wertheim, USC students, faculty, staff, students from nearby middle schools, and other volunteers built the level-three Mosely Snowflake Fractal out of 49,000 folded business cards. The fractal takes its name from engineer and mathematical origami artist Jeannine Mosely, who designed the construction process. The snowflake is a relative of the famous Menger Sponge, which Mosely also built from business cards in 2006.

Read the rest

The second item of note from my rummage on Shapeways this morning is Wahtah's Sierpinski tetrahedron, a fractal pyramid with 499,994 faces.

Sierpinski tetrahedron

Todd Johnson's Shockfossils are "multimillion volt Lichtenberg figures in acrylic." He masks acrylic slabs with lead and then rents time on a commercial particle accelerator and the result are beautiful, fern-like fractals.

Shockfossils on deviantART