From: veritasium
Engineers are increasingly drawing inspiration from origami, the ancient art of paper folding, for a wide range of modern applications [00:00:03]. This includes medical devices, space applications, and even bulletproofing [00:00:07]. The utility of origami in modern engineering stems from its ability to transform flat sheets, reduce size, increase rigidity, and create specific motions [00:02:25] [00:15:38].
The Evolution of Origami Design
Origami, literally meaning “folding paper,” has roots dating back at least 400 years in Japan [00:00:21]. Historically, the number of designs was limited, perhaps only 100 to 200 patterns in total [00:00:27]. A significant shift occurred in the 20th century, largely due to Japanese origami masters, particularly Akira Yoshizawa [00:00:42]. Yoshizawa created thousands of new designs and published numerous books, sparking a worldwide renaissance in origami creativity [00:00:55]. Today, tens of thousands of designs have been documented [00:00:37].
Core Principles for Engineering Applications
The fundamental benefit of origami for engineering is its method of transforming a flat sheet into complex shapes with minimal processing [00:02:29]. This includes:
- Size Reduction: Origami allows for a huge amount of size reduction, such as transforming a one-meter square sheet into a small, complex object like a cactus with many spines [00:01:42] [00:01:50].
- Increased Rigidity: The simple act of folding a material can inherently make it more rigid [00:04:52].
- Specific Motions: Origami designs can create “bi-stable” mechanisms that hold stable in two positions, or combine mechanisms for “magical” effects like color change [00:02:42] [00:03:02].
- Scalability: Origami principles are highly scalable, enabling both large-scale deployable structures and the miniaturization of devices [00:06:03] [00:09:04].
- Folding Thick Materials: Innovations in scoring and adding hinges allow thick, rigid materials like polypropylene to be folded, accommodating their thickness [00:05:11] [00:05:39].
Applications in Technology
Origami in modern engineering has led to practical solutions across various fields:
Medical Devices
- Flexible Catheter Support: Origami bellows have been developed to support flexible catheters used in surgical robots, preventing buckling and maintaining a consistent internal passage as the catheter moves within the body [00:03:20] [00:03:37].
- Miniature Grippers: Origami motions inspire designs for medical devices like forceps that can morph from a small size, suitable for minimal incision, into a larger gripper inside the body to perform complex tasks [00:08:24] [00:08:31]. An origami-inspired gripper used in robotic surgeries reduced the number of parts by 75% while being smaller and offering a wider range of motion [00:08:51].
- Nano Injectors: Microscopic origami designs can be used for medical applications like nano injectors for gene therapy, capable of delivering DNA to cells [00:10:03] [00:10:10]. These injectors are only four micrometers thick [00:10:16].
Space Technology
- Deployable Solar Panels: The Miura-ori pattern, considered a “granddaddy” of deployable structures, was one of the first origami patterns to fly on a space mission in 1995 for solar arrays [00:05:51] [00:05:55].
- Satellite Solar Arrays: The “origami flasher” pattern has been proposed for satellite solar arrays due to its ability to increase compactness for launch and enhance reliability during deployment [00:06:17] [00:06:27].
Structural and Mechanical Improvements
- Bulletproof Collapsible Walls: A foldable, bulletproof collapsible wall based on the Yoshimura crease pattern can be made from bulletproof material (e.g., 12 layers of Kevlar), allowing it to be compact in a police officer’s car and then deploy to stop handgun bullets [00:04:01] [00:04:34]. A new design aims to stop rifle rounds [00:04:37].
- Aerodynamics for Locomotives: Origami patterns are being researched to improve the aerodynamics of freight locomotives. A scaled prototype demonstrates a pattern that folds very flat but deploys as a nose cone, with computer models and wind tunnel testing showing potential savings of millions of dollars annually in diesel for companies [00:06:37] [00:07:04].
- Compliant Mechanisms: The functional motions of origami inspire new designs for compliant mechanisms that can achieve full 360-degree rotations, unlike traditional mechanisms with bearings or hinges [00:07:44]. An example is the “Kalita cycle,” a continuously revolving compliant mechanism [00:08:14].
Miniaturization
- Microscopic Flapping Bird: Research has successfully developed techniques to create microscopic self-folding origami, such as the world’s smallest origami flapping bird, which is smaller than a grain of salt [00:09:04] [00:09:38].
Mathematical Principles in Origami Design
The design of origami for engineering applications relies heavily on mathematics [00:10:55]. Understanding the curvature and coupling of lines and bends requires mathematical methods [00:11:01].
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Crease Patterns: Mathematical approaches allow for the representation of an origami design as a “crease pattern,” which is a plan for how to fold a specific object [00:12:08].
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Circle Packing Method: For designs that can be represented as a stick figure (e.g., a scorpion with claws, legs, and a tail), the circle packing method is used [00:12:21] [00:13:27]. This abstract concept involves:
- Representing each feature (claw, leg, tail) as a circular region [00:12:28].
- Arranging these circles on a square sheet of paper, similar to packing balls into a box [00:12:44].
- The arrangement of these circles forms the “skeleton” of the crease pattern [00:13:17].
- Geometric rules are then applied to construct the full crease pattern, such as drawing lines between circle centers and adding “ridge folds” where lines meet [00:13:22] [00:13:32].
- This systematic process ensures the folded pattern will produce the exact desired shape [00:14:15].
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Origamizer Algorithm: For more complex, surface-like shapes (e.g., a sphere or an elephant’s body), a Japanese mathematician named Tomohiro Tachi developed an algorithm called “Origamizer” around 10 years ago [00:15:07] [00:15:25]. This algorithm takes a triangulated surface as a mathematical description and outputs the folding pattern to create that surface from a sheet of material [00:15:16].
In essence, origami-inspired technology leverages centuries of folding experimentation, combined with rigorous mathematical modeling and experimentation, to develop innovative practical solutions [00:16:11] [00:16:20].