Uploaded May 2025 | Updated September 2026, 2 weeks ago
We are celebrating 100th anniversary of Dr. Nancy Grace Roman’s birth, we’re baking a birthday cake! Dr. Roman was @NASA's first chief astronomer and the namesake for our nearly complete Nancy Grace Roman Space Telescope.
This isn’t your ordinary birthday treat — this cosmic cake represents the contents of our universe and everything the Roman telescope will uncover.
Check out the full recipe: go.nasa.gov/43pNnEf
00:00 A woman with blond hair and glasses wearing a black polo with the Roman 18 detector logo on the top left is holding a whisk and is standing inside of a kitchen with two mixing bowls and a measuring cup.
00:10 A black round cake with black piping decor on it, gold powder is dusted onto the cake.
00:13 The woman pipes on black frosting onto the top of the cake and add more gold powder.
00:19 The cake slowly spins revealing a slice has been cut out. Various colorful candies and sprinkles spill out of the center of the cake. Close up on the cake.
00:28 The unfrosted cake is three layers stacked, going from biggest to smallest.
00:31 Blue dye is mixed into a mixing bowl of yellow cake mix. Red dye is mixed into another bowl of batter, and green dye into a third bowl of batter. The woman closes the oven with cake pans inside.
00:43 The woman adds yellow sprinkles to a bowl. Cut to a simulated image filled with bright white and yellow stars. Cut back to the woman adding white sprinkles and then to another simulated image of space filled with gas and dust.
00:59 The woman adds smaller, multicolor sprinkles and quarter sized chocolate and sprinkle covered disks to the bowl.
01:08 A simulated deep field builds up layer by layer. It depicts 4 layers of countless galaxies, the dots beginning red and becoming more yellow and larger.
01:19 The woman takes a bite of popping rock candy and then adds the rest of it into the bowl of candy.
01:25 On a black background with white stars, a large white star explodes, filling the frame with white light. At the beginning of the explosion, the initial small white sphere is surrounded by a disk of pale gas, siphoned from a much larger orange sphere to the left of the frame.
01:37 The woman picks up two bowls, one with chocolate pieces and the other with jawbreakers and pours them both into the larger bowl. Cut to a black background speckled with white stars, a blue and black marbled sphere glows with blue light while spinning rapidly.
01:46 A white and brown disk of gas wraps around the front of a dark black circle, obscuring it so only a semicircle of black is visible. The gas wraps up and around the top of the circle, forming an overall shape of a sombrero. Behind the sombrero shape, the stars on the black background smear into concentric circles that appear to spin around the black circle.
01:50 The woman adds colorful round candy to the bowl. Cut to the tilted face of a galaxy made of several orange and blue rings. A beam of light streams from the center of the galaxy.
2:02 The woman holds whole cookies in one hand and crushed up ones in the other. She adds both into the bowl. Cut to an artist's rendering of a large blue and tan striped sphere in the left side of the frame, encircled by dusty brown rings.
2:07 A swirling disk of orange and red gas and dust circles a white glowing orb.
2:10 A cake on a plate. Colorful layers of the cake are exposed — a thick red layer on the bottom, a less thick blue layer in the middle, and a very thin green layer on top. Overlaid on the red layer, text reads, “68% dark energy.” Overlaid on the blue layer, text reads, “25% dark matter.” Overlaid on the green layer, text reads, “5% normal matter.”
2:21 A black circle with several spokes extending from it obscures darkness filled with white stars and white and brown dust and gas. A zoom out reveals that space is being reflected in the primary mirror of a 3D rendering of Roman.
2:27 The Roman telescope’s outer layer sits on a white platform pushed away from the camera by several people.
2:31 The cake, now with a slice removed, rotates to expose the cake's layers — red on the bottom, blue in the middle, and a very thin green layer on top. From the core of the cake spills an assortment of colorful candy and sprinkles.
2:33 A blurred video of a scrolling webpage of the Education and Outreach Materials section of go.nasa.gov/4jZawo3. On screen text reads go.nasa.gov/4jZawo3.
Music credit: “Instinctive Touch,” Timothy Paul Handels [SABAM], Universal Production Music
Credit: NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center
Producer and Editor: Laine Havens
Videographer: Sophia Roberts
If you liked this video, subscribe to the NASA Goddard YouTube channel: youtube.com/NASAGoddard
Follow NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center · Instagram: instagram.com/nasagoddard
· X: twitter.com/NASAGoddard
· Facebook: facebook.com/NASAGoddard
· Flickr: flickr.com/photos/gsfc
We are celebrating 100th anniversary of Dr. Nancy Grace Roman’s birth, we’re baking a birthday cake! Dr. Roman was @NASA's first chief astronomer and the namesake for our nearly complete Nancy Grace Roman Space Telescope.
This isn’t your ordinary birthday treat — this cosmic cake represents the contents of our universe and everything the Roman telescope will uncover.
Check out the full recipe: go.nasa.gov/43pNnEf
00:00 A woman with blond hair and glasses wearing a black polo with the Roman 18 detector logo on the top left is holding a whisk and is standing inside of a kitchen with two mixing bowls and a measuring cup.
00:10 A black round cake with black piping decor on it, gold powder is dusted onto the cake.
00:13 The woman pipes on black frosting onto the top of the cake and add more gold powder.
00:19 The cake slowly spins revealing a slice has been cut out. Various colorful candies and sprinkles spill out of the center of the cake. Close up on the cake.
00:28 The unfrosted cake is three layers stacked, going from biggest to smallest.
00:31 Blue dye is mixed into a mixing bowl of yellow cake mix. Red dye is mixed into another bowl of batter, and green dye into a third bowl of batter. The woman closes the oven with cake pans inside.
00:43 The woman adds yellow sprinkles to a bowl. Cut to a simulated image filled with bright white and yellow stars. Cut back to the woman adding white sprinkles and then to another simulated image of space filled with gas and dust.
00:59 The woman adds smaller, multicolor sprinkles and quarter sized chocolate and sprinkle covered disks to the bowl.
01:08 A simulated deep field builds up layer by layer. It depicts 4 layers of countless galaxies, the dots beginning red and becoming more yellow and larger.
01:19 The woman takes a bite of popping rock candy and then adds the rest of it into the bowl of candy.
01:25 On a black background with white stars, a large white star explodes, filling the frame with white light. At the beginning of the explosion, the initial small white sphere is surrounded by a disk of pale gas, siphoned from a much larger orange sphere to the left of the frame.
01:37 The woman picks up two bowls, one with chocolate pieces and the other with jawbreakers and pours them both into the larger bowl. Cut to a black background speckled with white stars, a blue and black marbled sphere glows with blue light while spinning rapidly.
01:46 A white and brown disk of gas wraps around the front of a dark black circle, obscuring it so only a semicircle of black is visible. The gas wraps up and around the top of the circle, forming an overall shape of a sombrero. Behind the sombrero shape, the stars on the black background smear into concentric circles that appear to spin around the black circle.
01:50 The woman adds colorful round candy to the bowl. Cut to the tilted face of a galaxy made of several orange and blue rings. A beam of light streams from the center of the galaxy.
2:02 The woman holds whole cookies in one hand and crushed up ones in the other. She adds both into the bowl. Cut to an artist's rendering of a large blue and tan striped sphere in the left side of the frame, encircled by dusty brown rings.
2:07 A swirling disk of orange and red gas and dust circles a white glowing orb.
2:10 A cake on a plate. Colorful layers of the cake are exposed — a thick red layer on the bottom, a less thick blue layer in the middle, and a very thin green layer on top. Overlaid on the red layer, text reads, “68% dark energy.” Overlaid on the blue layer, text reads, “25% dark matter.” Overlaid on the green layer, text reads, “5% normal matter.”
2:21 A black circle with several spokes extending from it obscures darkness filled with white stars and white and brown dust and gas. A zoom out reveals that space is being reflected in the primary mirror of a 3D rendering of Roman.
2:27 The Roman telescope’s outer layer sits on a white platform pushed away from the camera by several people.
2:31 The cake, now with a slice removed, rotates to expose the cake's layers — red on the bottom, blue in the middle, and a very thin green layer on top. From the core of the cake spills an assortment of colorful candy and sprinkles.
2:33 A blurred video of a scrolling webpage of the Education and Outreach Materials section of go.nasa.gov/4jZawo3. On screen text reads go.nasa.gov/4jZawo3.
Music credit: “Instinctive Touch,” Timothy Paul Handels [SABAM], Universal Production Music
Credit: NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center
Producer and Editor: Laine Havens
Videographer: Sophia Roberts
If you liked this video, subscribe to the NASA Goddard YouTube channel: youtube.com/NASAGoddard
Follow NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center · Instagram: instagram.com/nasagoddard
· X: twitter.com/NASAGoddard
· Facebook: facebook.com/NASAGoddard
· Flickr: flickr.com/photos/gsfc
