​This exploratory design for a space platform was the first of two technical proposals that Future Systems made to NASA in the mid-1980s under NASA's Small Business Innovation Research programme. It occurred at a time that NASA was studying several approaches to the design of structures for the Space Station after the project's go-ahead in 1984. Among these were self-deploying structures that arrived on the Space Shuttle in folded and stowed form and then opened out in orbit, as in the NASA image below. This design comprises a flat-packed set of trusses linked together by a system of hinged V-shaped spars that nest inside the truss's depth for Shuttle launch. Repeating this multiple times results in a highly efficient structure as a payload. Once in orbit, the platform unfolds in a bay-by-bay sequence controlled

by spring-loaded and

self-locking joints.

The nesting ability

of a Russian

matryoshka doll

inspired the

design.