3D print Biosphere 2
A free, printable model of the glass-roofed structure and the green hillside, roads and round tanks around it, generated from real map data in your browser.
Free, in your browser. Exports a slicer-ready 3MF.
About Biosphere 2
Biosphere 2 is an Earth system science research facility in Oracle, Arizona, near the foot of the Santa Catalina Mountains and roughly 50 minutes north of Tucson. The structure covers 1.27 hectares (3.14 acres) and was built between 1987 and 1991 as an artificial, materially closed ecological system. It holds the record as the largest closed ecological system ever built. The site is at about 1,200 m (4,000 feet) above sea level.
Ed Bass, a businessman, and John P. Allen, a systems ecologist, launched the project in 1984, and Bass put up US$150 million in funding through 1991. It was planned to test whether closed ecosystems could support human life in outer space. Inside were seven areas: a rainforest, an ocean with a coral reef, mangrove wetlands, a savannah grassland, a fog desert, an agricultural system, and a human habitat containing living quarters, laboratories and workshops. The name reflects the idea of a second fully self-sufficient biosphere, with Earth itself as the first.
Above ground, the structure used steel tubing plus high-performance glass and steel frames, and Pearce Structures, Inc., a firm run by Peter Jon Pearce, designed and made the frame and glazing materials. Its seals had to be almost perfectly airtight. Because the air inside expanded by day and contracted at night, the structure had large diaphragms housed in domes called lungs, which avoided the huge forces that a constant volume would create. The closed-system experiment was run twice, from 1991 to 1993 and from March to September 1994, and the University of Arizona became the full owner in 2011.
How it prints
Make this print opens the generator on a 600 m square around the landmark. Buildings print at close to true scale, so the landmark grows with the print size.
| Print size | Landmark height | Scale |
|---|---|---|
| 160 mm default | 10 mm | 1:3,750 |
| 200 mm | 12 mm | 1:3,000 |
| 256 mm | 15 mm | 1:2,344 |
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North
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East
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South
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West
- Fine frames on the glass roofs
- The pyramids and long vaults carry a fine frame pattern. Print friendly adapts it to the print scale; Full detail keeps every frame line, which suits a larger print or a fine nozzle.
- A slim tower beside the domes
- The small tower next to the rounded domes is slender. Printing slowly and using layers of 0.12 to 0.16 mm helps it come out cleanly.
- One piece with the ground
- Biosphere 2 is joined to the ground in the exported file, and the four-side check found no floating parts, so nothing needs gluing.
- Pick the detail for your nozzle
- In the Buildings settings, set Landmark detail to Print friendly to adapt thin parts and small details to the print scale. Full detail keeps every modeled feature, for larger prints or a finer nozzle.
- Colors
- Buildings, roads, water and ground arrive as separate filament slots in the 3MF. Biosphere 2 takes the building color.
- File format
- You get a 3MF for Bambu Studio, OrcaSlicer or PrusaSlicer. Any of them can save it as STL if you need one.
About this model
Biosphere 2 is one of more than 2,300 landmark models in Mini Skyline. They are made with AI, and each one is checked from four sides in its real surroundings before release. Everything around it is built from OpenStreetMap and Overture map data. If you would rather print the shape from map data, turn off Landmark models in the Buildings settings.
Common questions
Is there a Biosphere 2 STL I can download?
Mini Skyline builds the file for you in your browser and exports 3MF, which every major slicer opens. If you need an STL, open the 3MF in your slicer and export it from there.
How big can I print it?
Any print size from 40 mm across. Biosphere 2 grows with the print: about 10 mm tall on the default 160 mm print. For a model larger than your printer bed, Project Mode splits the area into tiles.
Is it free?
Yes. Generation runs in your browser, with no account and nothing behind a paywall.
