Origami adjusted for the cosmos

TThe enchanting origami figures are not only works of art – they could help scientists adapt to more critical equipment during travel through the cosmos.

The complex folding models observed in this image emerged from creative crafts by Zhongyuan Wang, undergraduate student at Brigham Young University in Utah. Wang has been interested in origami since he was a child, he said The New York Times, And his experiences over the years have led to what is now recognized as a new family of flower -shaped origami techniques – called flowering patterns, these finely folded forms can be pressed flat and precipitated to create a central cavity.

Wang has chosen to attend byu largely due to the work of Larry Howell, a mechanical engineering professor who has long done research on the inspired conceptions of origami for use in space missions. When Wang showed his flowering models to Howell, he had not encountered anything. Howell and the physicist who has become Origami, Robert J. Lang, have put flowering models to a mathematical framework and highlighted a wider group of forms with similar characteristics, as indicated in a recent Acts of the Royal Society A paper.

These conceptions are particularly practical for spatial missions because they can be made from a single flat sheet which can then inflate considerably in size – impossible fees with other origami models. The flowering patterns are built by making folds of folds, or corners, around a polygon – like the blades of opening a camera. These districts can be easily dropped flat if necessary, and the combination of these folds makes the object larger. This could provide storage compartments for change in shape and space saving to store critical mission tools aboard the spacecraft. And in a critical way for space missions, flowering models tend to fold and take place quite reliable – an origami incident could spell a disaster in the cosmos.

This is not the first time that origami has been used to effectively store space tools. In 1995, Japan launched a satellite which incorporated a specially designed origami technique called the Miura fold to store and deploy a solar panel. More recently, the Howell team in Byu used origami to create a foldable antenna and a telescope for the spaceships – Tools envisaged for the use of NASA and the air force of the United States. Now, flowering models could be useful for similar space storage, as well as items such as solar shields for telescopes and containers for liquids.

Flowering models can also be useful here on earth: they could be used to assemble temporary shelters, or to build robots that can develop and shrink according to various tasks.

Main image: Brigham Young University

• Molly Glick

  Published on August 22, 2025

  Molly Glick is the editor of the newsletter of Nautilus.