Private companies are getting better and better at launching more and more mass into space with larger and larger rockets. But, there is still a major constraint on the size of objects we can get into orbit - fairing size. This places physical constraints on the overall shape of what we can launch, and severely limits the sizes of, say, a communications array or a power satellite. But a new paper from researchers at Nanjing University of Aeronautics and Astronautics and the Beijing Institute of Technology offers a solution - a self-shaping, deployable module that can fine-tune both its positioning and its own dimensions.

To understand how that offers an advantage, it’s best to look at how engineers currently solve this problem. Typically they use a rollable deployable boom - a stiff, thin strip of carbon fiber that can coil up like a tape measure, then unwind to snap straight once deployed in microgravity.…