Aura Atmospheric Satellite Gold-Foil Textured 3D Model

Aura, the satellite launched in 2004 to study Earth's atmosphere, including the ozone layer, air quality and climate. The model has a bright gold-foil textured body lined with instruments, grey radiator panels and a dish antenna, and one long solar array on a yoke, shown from its dark ribbed back and from its blue cell face.

Technical details: about 87,000 polygons and 83,000 vertices, UV-mapped, with 6 materials and 4 texture maps. It runs comfortably in desktop real-time scenes; decimate it for mobile or VR. It is scaled to 5 metres for AiZity's catalogue scale.

The download includes GLB for web viewers and three.js, FBX for Unity, Unreal Engine and Maya, OBJ as a widely supported mesh, and BLEND for Blender. Textures come in a separate folder. AiZity cleaned up the original (centred, grounded and renamed the parts) and converted it to these formats.

Good for atmospheric science and ozone lessons, air quality explainers, Earth observation animations and climate documentaries.

License: Public domain, made by NASA/Brian E. Kumanchik; NASA/Christian A. Lopez (a U.S. government work). Free for personal and commercial use; please credit NASA. NASA logos and insignia are not included, and use must not suggest NASA endorsement.