Summary: The Elusive Technique Of Folding

The Elusive Technique of Folding Anatomical Subjects
Christopher Yuki Itoh September 20, 2014
1 Introduction
The spirit of the Renaissance was portrayed through its insatiable curiosity about the natural world and the desire to explain how it works. With this, art and science flourished throughout the western world with the goal of sailing to- wards a greater future. While studying nature, people during the Renaissance found great interest in their own human body. Andreas Vesalius was one of those people. His masterpiece, De human corporis fabrica, offered the begin- ning of modern observational science and research [SO13]. Leonardo da Vinci, another well known inventor, painter, and anatomist of the time, initially stud- ied anatomy and took

Then, the details, such as the formation of the folds in the brain called ”gyrification”, arise next. This happens because during gyrification, the denser area of neurons will bulge out during brain development [whi13]. My current work focuses on recreating the folding process to mirror brain development by embedding muscle (memory) wires into the paper so that the paper self-folds from an embryonic form to an adult form.
In a human, the folds in the brain occur because of a differentiation in the surface area. This is not the case in origami. In origami, features can not grow ”larger” than the size of the paper. Also, a human hand is needed to fold the paper, whereas, in the developing brain, no hand is needed. It’s interesting to note that in brain development, folds arise from growth differentiation, but in origami, which cannot have different increases in surface area, the folds are supplied by a hand instead. The limitations in each situation seem to cancel out. [Daw09].
3.3

I believe that origami, like other forms of art, offers many advantages to students. As discussed above, designing anatomical subjects enhances obser- vational skills, which are important to the clinical setting. In addition, utilizing the flexibility of the paper can communicate important and complex topics. For example, Kathryn Tosney, PhD., developed the Origami Embryo, where the folding process itself demonstrates the developing embryo and organogenesis. Three different colors are used in this model, where blue, pink, and yellow, cor- respond to ectoderm, mesoderm, and endoderm, respectively