VOA慢速英语--折纸空间技术结合了艺术、设计、科学

Origami Space Technology Combines Art, Design, Science

Since he was eight years old, Robert Salazar has been making artistic¹ creations from folded paper.

Now, he is taking his love of origami to a different place: outer space.

Salazar works with the Jet Propulsion Laboratory of the United States space agency NASA. He says that ideas from origami can help design devices for research and exploration:

"Origami offers the potential to take a very large structure, even a vast structure, and you can get it to fit within the rocket, go up, then deploy² back out again. So it greatly magnifies what we are capable of building in space."

Researchers are using ideas from origami on several space agency projects.

Starshade

Manan Arya is a technologist at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory. He is working on a project called Starshade. The project's goal is to fit a large object into a rocket. Once the rocket reaches the correct point in space, the Starshade opens like a flower. This large flower shape is meant to block light to permit a space telescope to better see areas close to bright stars.

Starshade, Arya says, can be used to look for planets that orbit other stars.

"Seeing an exoplanet next to its parent star is like trying to image a firefly next to a search light, the searchlight being the star. Starshade seeks to block out that starlight so you can image a really faint exoplanet right next to it."

Other uses: a Robot and an Antenna³

Researchers are also using ideas from origami to design a robot and a special antenna for satellites.

The robot is called the Pop-up Flat Folding Explorer Robot, or PUFFER.

It can fold itself flat to get into small spaces. Salazar says the robot can explore environments "otherwise inaccessible⁴" to a robot. It could even be used to explore cave systems on our own planet, he adds.

Antennas⁵ on satellites capture and send communications signals.

Arya notes that the idea behind the special antenna's design is to pack it into very small satellites that are known as CubeSats. Arya says it is very useful to be able to fit large antennas into a small space:

"The bigger the antenna you have, the more gain your antenna has, so it is useful to have a big antenna that gets packaged into this tiny space that unfolds out to be a large antenna. The biggest CubeSat antennas we have right now are about half a meter."

NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory origami-based technologies have a graceful⁶ beauty. In origami, Salazar said, art, science and engineering only have small differences.

I'm John Russell.

Words in This Story

origami – n. the Japanese art of folding paper into shapes that look like birds, animals, etc.

deploy –v. : to open up and spread out the parts of (something, such as a parachute)

exoplanet – n. a planet that orbits a star outside the solar system.

inaccessible – adj. difficult or impossible to reach, approach, or understand : not accessible

technologist – n. someone who is an expert in technology

1 artistic   

adj.艺术(家)的，美术(家)的；善于艺术创作的

参考例句：

• The picture on this screen is a good artistic work.这屏风上的画是件很好的艺术品。
• These artistic handicrafts are very popular with foreign friends.外国朋友很喜欢这些美术工艺品。

2 deploy   

v.（军）散开成战斗队形，布置，展开

参考例句：

• The infantry began to deploy at dawn.步兵黎明时开始进入战斗位置。
• The president said he had no intention of deploying ground troops.总统称并不打算部署地面部队。

3 antenna   

n.触角，触须；天线

参考例句：

• The workman fixed the antenna to the roof of the house.工人把天线固定在房顶上。
• In our village, there is an antenna on every roof for receiving TV signals.在我们村里，每家房顶上都有天线接收电视信号。

4 inaccessible   

adj.达不到的，难接近的

参考例句：

• This novel seems to me among the most inaccessible.这本书对我来说是最难懂的小说之一。
• The top of Mount Everest is the most inaccessible place in the world.珠穆朗玛峰是世界上最难到达的地方。

5 antennas   

[生] 触角，触须（antenna的复数形式）

参考例句：

• Marconi tied several antennas to kites. 马可尼在风筝上系了几根天线。 来自超越目标英语 第3册
• Radio astronomy today is armed with the largest antennas in the world. 射电天文学拥有世界上最大的天线。

6 graceful   

adj.优美的，优雅的；得体的

参考例句：

• His movements on the parallel bars were very graceful.他的双杠动作可帅了!
• The ballet dancer is so graceful.芭蕾舞演员的姿态是如此的优美。