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With roots in the 17th century, traditional Japanese origami mines beauty from rules, limitations and, ultimately, mathematics. But there’s more to origami than just aesthetic value – scientists, engineers and designers have borrowed from the art form for a wide range of practical purposes. As this short from TED-Ed details, this includes a ‘starshade’ proposed by engineers at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory, intended to block exoplanet-hunting space telescopes from the glare of distant stars. Featuring appealing and instructive stop-motion visuals from the French animator Charlotte Arene, this short provides a nifty primer on how origami artists are able to fold square pieces of paper into near-infinite forms both beautiful and useful.
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History of science
Ideas ‘of pure genius’ – how astronomers have measured the Universe across history
29 minutes
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Making
On the Norwegian coast, a tree is transformed into a boat the old-fashioned way
6 minutes
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Engineering
Can monumental ‘ice stupas’ help remote Himalayan villages survive?
15 minutes
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Art
Background music was the radical invention of a trailblazing composer
17 minutes
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Computing and artificial intelligence
Why large language models are mysterious – even to their creators
8 minutes
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Engineering
From simple motors to levitating trains – how design shapes innovation
24 minutes
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Beauty and aesthetics
In art, the sublime is a feedback loop, evolving with whatever’s next to threaten us
9 minutes
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Beauty and aesthetics
Can you see music in this painting? How synaesthesia fuelled Kandinsky’s art
10 minutes
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Physics
To change the way you see the Moon, view it from the Sun’s perspective
5 minutes