Proceedings of the ASME 2014 International Design Engineering Technical Conferences &

Computers and Information in Engineering Conference

IDETC/CIE 2014
August 17-20, 2014, Buffalo, New York, USA

DETC2014-34315

APPLICATION OF ORIGAMI IN STARSHADE SPACECRAFT BLANKET DESIGN

Deborah Sigel Brian P. Trease Mark W. Thomson

Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Jet Propulsion Laboratory,
California Institute of Technology California Institute of Technology California Institute of Technology
Pasadena, CA, USA Pasadena, CA, USA Pasadena, CA, USA

David R. Webb Paul Willis P. Doug Lisman

Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Jet Propulsion Laboratory,
California Institute of Technology California Institute of Technology California Institute of Technology
Pasadena, CA, USA Pasadena, CA, USA Pasadena, CA, USA

ABSTRACT central ring blanket, which is a minimum of 20m in

A Starshade is a large deployable structure and sole
payload of an external occulter. At 34m in diameter or more,
starshades are designed to block most of the light from a nearby
star so that a small orbiting space telescope can image and
characterize the Earth-like exoplanets in orbit around it. The
starshade resembles a sunflower with a circular central disk
supporting petals that are arrayed around its periphery. The
petal edges are precisely shaped to match an optical profile that
prevents diffraction. The area circumscribed by the edges must
be completely opaque, black, and non-reflective. The petals and
ring structure are covered by specially designed deployable
blankets that must remain completely opaque even if they
become perforated by micrometeorites. The blankets must also
not cause any significant on-orbit thermoelastic loads on the
lightweight supporting ring and petal structures despite very
large differential thermal strains that are developed between
these Kapton blankets and the thermally stable composite ring
and petal structures. There are two types of blankets: one for
the deployable petals and one for the central support disc that is
formed by a lightweight deployable ring truss structure.
The starshade blankets cover such a large area that
they must be unusually lightweight compared to conventional
multi-layer insulated (MLI) spacecraft blankets. The blankets
must also stow around the central hub of the spacecraft with the
deployable ring and petal structures in a highly repeatable
fashion. This makes them ideal candidates for origami folding
schemes. Based on prior studies of large deployable rigid
arrays, we began with variants on the origami flasher to fold the
diameter. We looked at the simplest methods for integrating
this large blanket with a mechanical ring truss while providing
ample optical baffling and little to no thermally induced loads
on the structure. Petal blankets were also developed using
deployable softgoods with pseudo-mechanical and shingled
designs with optically blocking folds for deployment. The
design was developed iteratively utilizing a variety of
prototypes to explore and demonstrate the interaction between
the softgoods and rigid elements.
NOMENCLATURE
CTE—Coefficient of thermal expansion.
Tg—Glass transition temperature. The temperature below
which a material becomes brittle.
MLI—Multilayer insulation, spacecraft thermal blanketing.
INTRODUCTION
The Starshade Mission involves 2 synchronous
spacecraft, one an observatory, and one a starshade. The
starshade blocks the view of an exoplanet star so the
observatory, with a separation distance of 45,000km can
observe a planet orbiting that star.
Planet Starshade
Star Observatory
Figure 1: Exoplanet observation geometry [1]

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 The proposed starshade looks like a sunflower. It has
a 20 m diameter central ring with an array of 7m long petals
along the periphery. The current design calls for 28 petals. The
petal profile is driven an optical design that optimizes image
contrast.
Figure 2: Starshade Occulter
The large structure of the starshade lends itself to the
use of a deployable structure. The starshade when deployed
consist of a 20m diameter ring truss, with petals attached to the
longerons of the truss. When stowed, the ring truss folds up in
a smaller diameter ring around the central hub of the spacecraft,
and petals wrap around the outside of the stowed truss. For
reasons of mass and thermal stability the starshade petal
structures are made of graphite composite and bonded in a
manner that it has nearly 0 coefficient of thermal expansion
(CTE). All of the enclosed areas on the petal and inside of the
ring truss circle are covered by a matte black light blocking
micrometerorite protective blanket. This blanket must prevent
light from penetrating it without inducing any loads on the
starshade structure that would cause the structure to deform
from its desired shape. The edge profile precision of the petals
is so stringent (on the order of 50 microns) that this effectively
means no load on the structure is acceptable.
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Figure 3: Stowed Starshade with wrapped petals
Figure 4: Stowed Starshade in Cross Section
This paper discusses requirements, trades, and baseline
solutions for the starshade blankets. We used tangibles to
explore the possibilities and limitations of the softgoods in
addition to CAD.
DRIVING REQUIREMENTS
The blanket must block all light through and around
the blanket with micrometeorite impact taken into account.
This drove the design to a multilayer blanket with a separation
of 1-2 cm between outer layers. The blanket could not be
allowed to induce loads in the starshade, making optically
sealing the edges a challenge.
During operation, the sun is behind the starshade (on
the star side). To prevent glint off of the edge of the starshade
structure or blankets, a 6 degree keep out was established from
any exterior edge (around all the petal surfaces and the ring
area where the petals intersected. This resulted in a 14 cm inset
distance where the 1-2 cm separation distance would need to be
violated to meet optical requirements. For the same reason, the
blanket needed to be non-reflective and opaque.
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 Table 1: Table of Filler Material Densities
Density Areal Density
g/m^2 at g/m^2 at
Density of Potential Filler
.001" 2cm
Mat erials
(kg/m^3) (lbf/ft^3) thickness thickness
Thermarest Foamex Urethane 11.05 0.69
Thermarest Foamex Urethane with
75% lightweighting 8.49 0.53
Vel-Black (Energy Science Lab) 8640 539.54
Carbon Mat 20301A -Mat (Techfibres) 76.9 4.80
Carbon Veil 20301A - Veil (Techfibres) 82.9 5.18
Carbon Veil 20301B (Techfibres) 78.9 4.93
Figure 5: Petal Blanket Envelope Aramide Veil 20601A (Techfibres) 68 4.25
Carbon veil (Morgan AM&T) 80 5.00
Aerogel, flexible (NASA GRC) 132 8.24
Due to the size of the structure, mass was a huge
Composite spring --S glass (JPL) 0.644 0.04 0.013
driving factor in the design of the blanket due to the size of the Composite spring-pultruded carbon
structure. The target mass was < 95 kg (.31 km/m^3) for the (JPL) 0.785 0.05 0.016
Open cell Urethane Foam #1 32 2.00
ring blanket, and < 90 kg (.29 kg/m^3) for the sum of the petal Open cell Urethane Foam #2 29 1.81
blankets. Open cell Urethane Foam #3 114.5 7.15
Poron Urethane Foam 240.20 15.00
Lastly, the blanket needed to easily and repeatedly Black Kapton (no ripstop) 1562.99 97.60 39.7
stow against a tubular hub, leading us in the direction of Black Kapton (ripstop) 2157.48 134.73 54.8
origami.
We identified 3 potential spacing concepts that met our mass
TRADES FOR BLANKET SPACER MATERIAL requirements: Cast open cell urethane foam, an array of
We baselined 1 mil black kapton film with a reinforced longitudinal glass composite flat coil spring, and multiple
(ripstop) scrim for use in the outer layers of the blanket, based layers of crumpled kapton film. Schematics of these
on its excellent strength to weight ratio and nearly lambertian configurations are shown below.
black optical properties.

Figure 6: Cast urethane foam inside a sandwich of crinkled

black kapton

Figure 5: Black Kapton (1mil) with scrim on underside

With 2 layers of 1 mil black kapton, our gap filler material

would need a density less than 10.3 kg/m^3 (0.65 lb/ft^3). A
table of proposed material is shown below. Highlighted cells
depict materials that we felt were close to our requirement.

Figure 7: Flat Coils of S-Glass bonded to a kapton support film

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 Figure 8: Mockup of flat coil on kapton

Figure 10: Directional folding using a fan fold along length of

the petal.

Figure 9: Layered crumpled kapton

We identified a very low density cast urethane used by

Cascade Designs in their Thermarest ultra-light weight camping
mats that was within our target density range. In our
application the urethane foam would be cast into 2cm thick
sheets, light-weighted by machining, and spot bonded to the
outer layers of kapton. Light-weighting by adding holes or
pockets in the foam allows us to trade foam density for extra
layers of kapton. By nature of the foam, it provides a slow,
damped expansion, which is desirable. The primary limitation
of the foam is that it undergoes a glass transition temperature Figure 11: Directional folding using a bow fold along length of
(Tg) around -50C, well within our flight thermal operating the petal.
range. To mitigate this, the mission could deploy the petals and
blanket, and then turn the starshade to face the sun so that the
foam would warm beyond the Tg and slowly expand to 2 cm
thickness. The foam option is our leading approach at this
time.
Alternatively, the array of glass coils provides a
simple, discretely positioned way to space the film that is not
sensitive to Tg. However, the process of installing the coils on
the film, and the weight of the adhesive might be nontrivial.
Lastly, stacking crumpled, embossed, or dimpled kapton would
provide gaping, and good prevention of single path
micrometeorite holes. Testing is needed to confirm that the
kapton will rebound after being fully compressed over a long Figure 12: Miura fold on mylar
duration.

PETAL BLANKET DESIGN

The driving requirements for the petal blankets were
(1) preventing loading and deflection on the structure due to
CTE, and (2) providing ample optical protection. For a +/-
200C environment we expect a max thermal deflection of 2
inches (51mm) along the longest dimension of a petal. To
resolve CTE loading, concepts were developed with regularly
placed directional folds, omni-directional folds, and crumpling
on an oversized film.

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Figure 13: Dimpling Kapton as a spacer
Figure 14: Layering crumpled Kapton as a spacer
Directional folds, such as a fan and bow folds, were not ideal
since made sealing the blanket to the edge challenging, and did
not provide expansion laterally. As an omni-directional fold, a
Miura fold was applied to mylar film. This allowed for a fan-
like expansion in more than one direction, but still left a single
stiff direction. We found oversizing the blanket and crumpling
it was the easiest way to allow the blanket to expand and
contract in all directions. It was also easier to implement in the
full scale flight design than a regularly folded pattern (like the
Miura) on such large pieces of film. It is also possible to order
films with a regular dimple, as shown below, though usually
this is done only on non-scrim reinforced films.
Figure 15: Dimplar, dimpled aluminized mylar
To attach the film to the edge of the petal, we looked
at the very small expansion & contraction (by CTE) over small
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areas of the structure. We designed to allow the blanket to
expand and contract over small, discrete areas. We tightly
gathered the edge of an oversized kapton blanket with very
short peaks and spot bonded it to the frame, as shown below. In
this configuration the film could contract locally without
disturbing the structure. This does leave several small gaps
through the edge of the petal, which we resolved separately.
Since the petals can bend forward or backward, we
oversized the blankets for the worst case petal deflection, film
contraction from CTE, and added additional margin. The top
blanket is suspended above the bottom blanket, and is also
crumpled. To block light from entering the 2cm tall space, we
loosely wrapped the edge of the bottom blanket onto the top
blanket upper surface, and adhesively staked it (still
crumpled/gathered) at several points. This left the only gap
between the bottom blanket and the frame. By adding a
continuous bead of carbon black silicone along the edge
outboard of the blanket, we create a baffle to close out that
particular light path. The 6-degree keep out would have to be
dealt with carefully to ensure that the foam is contoured and
placed inboard, and the overwrap does not stick out too far
beyond the top blanket. It should be noted that we developed
these concepts by experimenting with black kapton, foam and
felt spacers, and other materials, as shown below.
Figure 18: Petal blanket mockup
As an alternative design, we are considering stringing
up the blanket on a cord, and allowing it to float inside of a
groove in the petal frame. This is challenging since the frame
is only .090” thick. A mockup of this design was built from a
rapid prototype frame, kapton film, and off the shelf PTFE
cord.
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 Figure 19: In-frame groove concept

CENTRAL RING BLANKET

For the central ring blanket the main focus was how to
fold the large disc shape onto the hub and interface with the
truss. We started with a 28-faceted flasher, based on experience
with the flasher on a large deployable solar array (a
Figure 20: A 30-sided flasher fold pattern (prior to design
development in partnership with Shannon Zirbel and Robert
change to a 28 petal design)
Lang). We found on that project that the origami flasher is a
convenient folding pattern for wrapping a flat film or rigid
structure around a hub. In a flasher there are primary fold lines
(straight or curved) that emanate from the hub area, and
optional secondary folds that start at a larger radius from the
hub. To avoid having to spend extensive time optimizing a
math model for the flasher we simplified the flasher to have 3
rules: the primary fold lines should alternate between mountain
and valley folds, the lines should be alternating tangent lines to
the hub and angular bisectors between tangent lines, and all
lines should be straight. On a common flasher, secondary (or
more) folds, decrease the height of the stowed shape by
bringing the triangular points of the stowed flasher back into
the structure so that there is a flat top and bottom of the
structure. Since we were concerned with the thickness of the
stowed blanket, we chose to use only the primary fold lines.
Using only 1 division, rather than a double fold, as is typically Figure 21: For comparison, a traditional flasher folding pattern
seen in a flasher, we came up with the pattern below. for a hex flasher with near zero thickness that uses straight
lines, rather than curves.

The size of the blanket and facet size was driven by our truss
design. The pattern uses 14 tangential rays off of the central
circle, and 14 angular bisectors originating from the points
where the rays intersect the circle, just like a flasher. The
stowed folded pattern has 1 flat side, and one irregular side,
with the height of the stowed blanket equal to the height of the
stowed truss. Patterns were generated using a CAD sketch and
then printed to scale on polypropylene to test. Designs were
then transferred onto mylar film and folded with adhesive-
backed felt as a spacer material to simulate our film-to-film
spacing on the flight system.

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 The starshade’s truss is a 4-bar mechanism ring truss
with short battons (vertical elements) and rotating longer
longerons (horizontal elements when deployed). When
properly designed the blanket attaches to the top of the truss
without any changes in dimension (stretching the blanket is not
acceptable). Initially the truss and blanket did not appear to fold
in the same fashion when stowing. Our 28-sided flasher
blankets terminated with a sharktooth pattern, while the truss
took a square wave shape, with a gap that opened up at the top
of the longerons, as shown in the figures below.
Figure 22: Deployed Truss
Figure 23: Stowed truss with blanket contact lines highlighted
in red, and areas of changing length in dotted green.
Figure 24: Blanket sharktooth pattern, as shown on a hex-
flasher model.
To find common fixed attachment points between the
blanket and the truss we built a scale truss out of rapid
prototyped battens and brass longerons. We looked at potential
places to bond to the blanket, and other places to cut the
blanket. After looking at more traditional flasher patterns, we
identified a line perpendicular to the longeron edge along the
blanket, the same width as the batten, which we could cut in the
film to allow the longerons to separate during stow. The two
points at the beginning of this relief became stable mounting
points for the truss. This allowed the truss to remain in contact
with the blanket during stowage and deployment. The relief
also allowed for the (n+1)th section of the blanket to undergo
crumpling when the blanket is folded.
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Figure 25: Scaled blanket with cutouts installed on model
truss.
Figure 26: Cut reliefs to allow the truss and blanket to stow
together. Crumpling area shown by orange arrow.
To prevent CTE induced loading on the truss, the
blanket will be oversized, and if needed the surface Kapton can
be crumpled.
There are tensioned cable spokes that run from the hub
to the truss in an X-formation (in cross section), and along
tangent lines to the hub diameter. Half of these spokes will fit
nicely under the folds of the flasher blanket. The back side of
the blanket will be loosely attached to tensioned cable spokes
that run from the hub to the truss to keep the blanket from
billowing, or inducing loads on the spokes. Since the geometry
of the truss and hub do not actually create a flat plane, as shown
below, the blanket will actually need to be slightly conical or
compound conical to follow the stowed starshade geometry.
Experiments will be performed to transfer the flat pattern to the
more conical patterns, based on prior work on deployable
parabolic dishes and work by Nojima [2].
7 Copyright © 2014 by ASME
 Figure 27: Spoke arrangement between hub and truss with
potential conical or compound conical blanket geometries in
green and purple.

CONCLUSION
For a 34m large starshade occulter we developed a low
density optical blocking blanket that met the majority of the
project requirements. The blanket consisted of a bi-layer
crumpled 1mil black kapton film separated by an ultra-low
density urethane foam, that had been further lightweighted by
pocketing. The blanket for the starshade petals was oversized
for the petal, gathered, and bonded to the structural edge as to
limit loading. The blanket edges were sealed out using a
blanket fold over baffle, and a bead of RTV along the edge
outboard of the petal. The ring blanket utilized a similar
construction as the petal blanket, and folded around a hub using
a 28-sided origami flasher pattern. The blanket was slit along
perpendiculars to the edge facets to allow for the kinematics of
the truss. This provided good static attachment points between
truss and blanket.
Future work will look into how the ring and petals will
overlap to prevent a light path, and how to taper the filler
material to maintain our glint requirement. Recent concerns
about the optical properties of the crumpled film may lead us
away from small scale folds and crumpling and into a
configuration with oversized panels or large scale overlapping
sections. Time will tell, as the starshade develops into a flight
mission.

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
This research was carried out at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory,
California Institute of Technology, under a contract with the
National Aeronautics and Space Administration.
Special thanks to Brian Trease for presenting this
paper in the lead author’s absence. Thanks to Robert Lang and
Shannon Zirbel whose contribution to the Large Deployable
Solar Array task at JPL that enabled us to seriously and
quantitatively consider origami in our deployable designs.

REFERENCES
[1] Kasdin, N. J., et al. “Advancing technology for starlight
suppression via an external occulter”. Technology development
for exoplanet missions. Technology Milestone Whitepaper.
January 24, 2011. JPL Document D-68672.

[2] Nojima, T. (2007). Origami Modeling of Functional

Structures based on Organic Patterns.”

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