Current Student Collaborations Participants
View a list of the students, faculty, staff, and mentors currently involved in Psyche Student Collaborations.
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Psyche Inspired
A Design for Discovery
Addison Mayhew
February 6th, 2026
Major: New Media Design
Genre/Medium: Vector Illustration in Adobe Illustrator
About the work:
“A Design for Discovery” is a digital vector illustration inspired by the Psyche mission and humanity’s enduring pursuit of knowledge. Rendered in a blueprint-based visual language, the piece frames space exploration not as distant science fiction, but as the result of deliberate human ingenuity, courage, and care. At its core, the work asks the viewer to consider how far intention and curiosity can carry us—and how something once thought unreachable can become tangible through planning, collaboration, and belief.
The blueprint aesthetic is central to the meaning of the piece. Blueprints represent the unseen labor behind discovery: the calculations, revisions, failures, and quiet moments of problem-solving that precede every monumental achievement. By presenting Psyche—a metal-rich asteroid believed to be the exposed core of a planetesimal—as a drafted, measured object, the illustration emphasizes that exploration is not accidental; it is engineered. Every line, label, and orbit is a testament to human persistence and our desire to understand the ancient structures that shaped our solar system. Read more…
Psyche Inspired Overview
Psyche Inspired is a program that brings undergraduate students from any discipline or major together to share the excitement, innovation, and scientific and engineering content of NASA’s Psyche mission with the public in new ways through artistic and creative works. These works are posted in the gallery above and highlighted on X, Facebook, and Instagram. View the full resolution images in the image gallery. This year’s Psyche Inspired cohort is known as the Platinum Class.
Psyche Inspired was piloted at ASU during the 2017-2018 academic year. The following academic year, Psyche Inspired expanded nationally! The works from each Psyche Inspired cohort are collected in individual downloadable books that tell the story of Psyche through musical scores, sculptures, painting, 3-D models, photography, acrylic art, needlepoint, stop-motion films, mixed media, and more.
Click here to view all the Psyche Inspired books
Take a look at our comprehensive map that shows how the Psyche Inspired program has grown over the years!
