WooT! This guy sounds like a great Convention Guest...

[lsanderson]

Origami as the Shape of Things to Come
By MARGARET WERTHEIM

"CAMBRIDGE, Mass. - "Some people don't even think this exists," says Dr. Erik Demaine, turning in his hands an elaborately folded paper structure. The intricately pleated sail-like form swooshes gracefully in a compound curve and certainly looks real enough - if decidedly tricky to make."

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[beamjockey.livejournal.com]

Along the same lines: A talk Robert J. Lang gave at Fermilab is available on streaming video. From the abstract:

The last decade of this past century has been witness to a revolution in the development and application of mathematical techniques to origami, the centuries-old Japanese art of paper-folding. The techniques used in mathematical origami design range from the abstruse to the highly approachable. In this talk, I will describe how geometric concepts led to the solution of a broad class of origami folding problems – specifically, the problem of efficiently folding a shape with an arbitrary number and arrangement of flaps, and along the way, enabled origami designs of mind-blowing complexity and realism, some of which you'll see, too. As often happens in mathematics, theory originally developed for its own sake has led to some surprising practical applications. The algorithms and theorems of origami design have shed light on long-standing mathematical questions and have solved practical engineering problems. I will discuss examples of how origami has enabled safer airbags, Brobdingnagian space telescopes, and more.

(If you don't have the bandwidth for streaming video, or the attention span to sit through it, you might still benefit from looking at the slides from Lang's talk, available at the same site.)