Origami is the ancient Japanese art of paper folding. One uncut square of paper can, in the hands of an origami artist, be folded into a bird, a frog, a sailboat, or a Japanese samurai helmet beetle.

Programmable stiff sheets with a single low-energy folding motion have been sought in fields ranging from the ancient art of origami to modern meta-materials research. Despite such attention, only two ...

Editor’s Note: This story was first printed on Jan. 20, 2018. It is reprinted here as part of our year end coverage. Origami paperwork creates delicate sculptures through intricate folds. Each crease ...