Origami crane. Photo Credit: Wikipedia.org
Most of us can remember the days in elementary school where we learned to make paper cranes, flowers, boxes and all manner of things just by folding paper. I was never one to master the art of origami but I can make a pretty nice paper air plane! This technique of folding paper has generated a lot of interest in the engineering world. The National Science Foundation has provided a grant to a few top universities to research this. The goal is the creation of materials that can fold up into very small places and then unfold when needed. Imagine a solar collector that could unfold like a flower in sunshine then collapse again at night or when power is not needed. Read a full article about it on the American Society of Mechanical Engineers’ website here: https://www.asme.org/engineering-topics/articles/design/engineering-meets-art
