“If I make a paper plane using a piece of paper, and then unfold it, you will be able to fold it exactly as I did because there is a memory of folding left in that piece of paper,” says Prof. Divakaran. But, complains Shraddha, this does not apply to Kanjeevaram sarees! Where she’s going, Shraddha won’t need a saree. A kimono will do just fine. Our friendly mathematics professor and his eager student journey to Japan in their quest to unravel numbers. Origami, the Japanese art of paper folding, is more than an aesthetic pursuit of hobbyists. It packs in its intricate folds many fascinating clues to understanding prime numbers and other mathematical concepts. Previously in this series, we visited ancient Greece, India, Egypt, and Babylon. Queue our past episodes and catch up on the playlist.

Credits:

Akshay Ramuhalli, Bijoy Venugopal, Bruce Lee Mani, Narayan Krishnaswamy, Prashant Vasudevan, Sananda Dasgupta, Seema Seth, Shraddha Gautam, Supriya Joshi and Velu Shankar

Discover more:

Article | Tree-maker algorithm: https://langorigami.com/article/treemaker/

Book | Thomas C Hull | Project Origami: Activities for Exploring Mathematics, Second Edition (AK Peters/CRC Recreational Mathematics Series) https://www.amazon.in/Project-Origami-Activities-Exploring-Mathematics/dp/1466567910

Book | Thomas C Hull | Origametry: Mathematical Methods in Paper Folding https://www.amazon.in/Origametry-Mathematical-Methods-Paper-Folding/dp/1108478727

Article | Miura Folding - Applying Origami to Space Explorations https://www.ijpam.eu/contents/2012-79-2/8/8.pdf

YouTube video | DW News | The girl that became Hiroshima's icon for world peace - Sadako Sasaki and the 1000 paper cranes https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FzIB4LkVtUE

YouTube video: The Smithsonian Channel | Language without Numbers? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nDM8G5tuHF8

Article: Recursion And Human Thought - Why The Pirahã Don't Have Numbers | A Talk With Daniel L. Everett | The Edge https://www.edge.org/conversation/daniel_l_everett-recursion-and-human-thought

Website | Mathigon.org | Mathematical Origami https://mathigon.org/origami