The intersections between origami, mathematics, and science occur at many levels and include many fields of the latter. We can group these intersections into roughly three categories: Origami mathematics, which includes the mathematics that describes the underlying laws of origami; Computational origami, which comprises algorithms and theory devoted to the solution of origami problems by mathematical means; Origami technology, which is the application of origami (and folding in general) to the solution of problems arising in engineering, industrial design, and technology in general. One genre blends into another. Origami math defines the "ground rules" for computational origami's goal of solving origami design problems (and quantifying their difficulty). The results of computational origami, in turn, can be (and have been) pressed into service to solve technological problems ranging from consumer products to the space program. Origami, like music, also permits both composition and performance as expressions of the art. Over the past 35 years, I have developed over 480 original origami compositions. About a quarter of these have been published with folding instructions, which, in origami, serve the same purpose that a musical score does: it provides a guide to the performer (in origami, the folder) while allowing the performer to express his or her own personality website includes galleries of my designs, crease patterns, schedule of my lectures, appearances and exhibitions, commissioned works, and more on the science of origami.

--- Robert J. Lang

8 files, last one added on Aug 19, 2009

An aspect of my art work that I particularly enjoy is that I write the software for all the programs I use and build the computers that run the software. In this sense, I like to feel that theory (mathematics), art (outcome), software (algorithms) and engineering (hardware) are integrated and interdependent and that no part survives without the others.

--- Mike Field

8 files, last one added on May 21, 2009

Computers make it possible for me to "see" the beauty of mathematics. The artworks in the gallery of "Mathscapes" were created using a variety of mathematical formulas.

--- Anne M. Burns

13 files, last one added on May 05, 2009