Origami in Orbit: Ancient Art Inspires Efficient Spacecraft

Space.com ^ | November 16, 2017 07:16am ET | Samantha Mathewson,

[BenLurkin]

The ancient art of origami has inspired designs for numerous pieces of hardware on NASA missions, allowing scientists to pack more technology into smaller space-bound packages.

For example, the agency is working on a piece of hardware called Starshade, which looks like a massive sunflower and could be made compact using what's known as an iris-folding pattern. 

This pattern allows Starshade to be packed down into a space small enough to fit atop a rocket; the object could then unfurl to its full diameter of about 85 feet (26 meters) in space, according to NASA. Starshade would be used to block the light of distant stars so that a space-based telescope could image faint exoplanets in orbit around those stars.

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Other space hardware designs inspired by origami include solar arrays, experimental wings designed for the space shuttle program in the 1980s and Echo 1, an inflatable, 10-story-tall satellite that was packed into a 26-inch-diameter (66 centimeters), spherical payload canister for launch. 

Another origami-inspired experimental concept currently underway is called Transformers for Lunar Extreme Environments, which would consist of mirrors that would unfold in space and bounce the sun's rays into deep craters on the moon. If humans return to the lunar surface, the solar energy from Transformers could melt water ice and even be used to power machinery, according to the statement.

[BenLurkin]

An artist's depiction of a sunflower-shaped starshade that could help space telescopes find and characterize alien planets.
Credit: NASA/JPL/Caltech

[ClearCase_guy]

Not to be too pedantic, but Origami does not mean “cleverly folded stuff”.

It means “paper folding”. So, if this sunflower-shaped starshade is made of paper, then it is Origami in orbit. Otherwise, not.

[Vaquero]

I watched a science channel show on this. They had a very large working model of it in an basketball court size room. When they let it unfold it bound up and jammed. I guess there was a few kinks to get out yet.