Project is a 'sequence of small inspirations that led to innovations'
It's hard to imagine modern life without cell phones, GPS navigation, wide-spread internet, weather forecasting, satellite TV and powerful military capacities. The Space Age has transformed life on Earth. From Sputnik to the International Space Station, we now have thousands of satellites orbiting Earth, providing necessary capacities to communicate and manage data.
But transporting these systems from earth to space is very complicated.
BYU’s Compliant Mechanisms Research lab, inspired by the ancient art of origami, is building a foldable, compact design that could help launch these systems to space in a rocket. After five years of research, a team led by professors Larry Howell and Spencer Magleby has created a foldable antenna and telescope than can deploy off space rockets and permanently open to enhance satellite systems.
“These systems represent a whole sequence of small inspirations that led to innovations,” Magleby said.
The antenna and telescope prototypes are being finalized to present to NASA and the U.S. Air Force. The prototypes are inspired by two origami designs that the researchers adapted to meet their engineering needs of compact design, automatic deployment and long-term stability. The team first experimented with origami designs on thin paper and then adapted them to thicker materials with adjustments for increased stability.
Magleby said the antenna folds into an extremely compact cube that wants to open on its own, thus requiring a wire to hold it in place prior to deployment. At some point in the flight (once it's in the desired location in orbit) the wire would be cut remotely and the antenna system would deploy and move away on a boom.
“So it's held in place, but it's ready to go all the time,” he said. “There's no power required or anything; it's all strained in there like a spring, ready to start the opening process.”
The main challenge has been in designing a structure that unfolds to a permanently flat antenna. Regular hinges do not work in the harsh space environment. Engineers focused on magnetic hinges as a potential solution. Magnetic attraction naturally forms a “bistable” hinge—one that then requires energy input to separate the magnets. The engineers needed to manipulate this magnetic force.
Post-doctoral researcher, Hunter Pruett, published a paper in 2023 showing how to achieve that energy input or “monostability” in magnetic design. This involves different ways of layering the magnets as well as placing them side-by-side along a hinge, naturally manipulating rotations that pop the compact antenna open once the wire holding the rectangular package in place is remotely severed. In a single, stable position, the antenna can open into a much larger and more powerful transmission device.
BYU’s highly collaborative group has involved multiple professors, post-doctoral researchers, students, and a continuing cooperation with electrical engineers at Florida International University. Research assistant, Katie Varela, thrives in the collaborative, inclusive, and hands-on environment:
“I love the people that I work with. I think that this lab is really good at being collaborative and supportive of ideas,” Varela said. “There’s no shame in saying something that sounds silly. I also really love that there are so many women engineers . . . everyone is supportive of family and things like that. It’s a great environment to learn in and feel like I would be prepared to go work in the real world.”
A long-time leader and collaborator in the field, Magleby said the project has built to its most complex level over time.
“One thing I've loved about this project is that we have not only been able to be inspired by the Holy Ghost or by things that come to us, but also by the work of so many other people,” he said. “As I look out and see what people have done with origami and art and other things, I think — wow — somehow those people have been inspired to create art that I love.”
Varela said there was no way they could have succeeded in the antenna project without applying the principles of origami. In fact, BYU is a leader in the origami-inspired systems that are transforming engineering. Magleby said the research is also transforming students.
“The product is not only the antenna; to me, the product is the students, and the learning that they've been able to accomplish, and the ways that they've been able to stretch their own thinking,” Magleby said.
