When you open an online order, its becoming a little less likely that youll find bubble wrap or packing peanuts inside the box. Amazon has phased out plastic air cushions. Some companies have started using more unusual alternatives including compostable inserts grown from mushrooms or plastic bags made from seaweed instead of fossil fuels. And in Finland, researchers have designed new paper packaging that gets its strength from origami folds.Origami wasnt available at a large scale in packaging applications, says Jarmo Kouko, a research team leader at VTT, a research and technology company owned by the Finnish government. I thought it could be something worth pursuing.[Image: courtesy VTT]Along with Aalto University researchers and a group of Finnish paper companies, the team started designing a machine that could replicate the process of intricately folding paper by hand. They began with the Miura fold, an origami pattern that was originally developed for a completely different purposecompactly packing up solar panels to power satellites (once theyre in space, the origami solar panels unfold).Using the pattern turns regular paperboard into a more protective material. The compressive strength is quite good, Kouko says. The mountains and valleys in the structure leave a lot of open space, so its quite lightweight. Its also durable. The performance can compete with something like polystyrene foam, he says.[Image: courtesy VTT]Its more expensive to make than cheap materials like bubble wrap. But as a growing number of brands want to find alternatives to plasticboth because of the problem of plastic waste and because almost all plastic is made from fossil fuelsits likely that it can find a market. Some governments are also beginning to ban unrecyclable packaging (the state of Washington, for example, has banned packing peanuts). The design is also visually interesting, and could be a fit for higher-priced products like some cosmetics, the team says.[Image: courtesy VTT]To protect the IP, Kouko declined to share details about how the machine works. But the process automates origami folding on full rolls of thick paper, working continuously. If a person was folding paper by hand, it might take a few hours to fold enough to package a bottle of wine. The machine takes seconds.The government-led project will end in early 2026, and then the paper companies that are involved will be allowed to commercialize the technology. Stora Enso, one of the partners working on the project, says that origami packaging could be on the market within three to five years.