Abstract
Shape morphing in response to an environmental stimulus, such as temperature, light, and chemical cues, is currently pursued in synthetic analogs for manifold applications in engineering, architecture, and beyond. Existing strategies mostly resort to active, namely smart or field responsive, materials, which undergo a change of their physical properties when subjected to an external stimulus. Their ability for shape morphing is intrinsic to the atomic/molecular structure as well as the mechanochemical interactions of their constituents. Programming shape changes with active materials require manipulation of their composition through chemical synthesis. Here, we demonstrate that a pair of off-the-shelf passive solids, such as wood and silicone rubber, can be topologically arranged in a kirigami bi-material to shape-morph on target in response to a temperature stimulus. A coherent framework is introduced to enable the optimal orchestration of bi-material units that can engage temperature to collectively deploy into a geometrically rich set of periodic and aperiodic shapes that can shape-match a predefined target. The results highlight reversible morphing by mechanics and geometry, thus contributing to relax the dependence of current strategies on material chemistry and fabrication.
Highlights
Shape morphing in response to an environmental stimulus, such as temperature, light, and chemical cues, is currently pursued in synthetic analogs for manifold applications in engineering, architecture, and beyond
The metaunit (Fig. 1a) consists of a rigid frame with low coefficient of thermal expansion (CTE) that encloses a soft core with high CTE, each responding to temperature at a different rate
While the underlying mechanism of thermal deformation of both R- and U-building block (BB) is caused by the CTE mismatch of the constituents, their topological difference is responsible for each floppy mode
Summary
Shape morphing in response to an environmental stimulus, such as temperature, light, and chemical cues, is currently pursued in synthetic analogs for manifold applications in engineering, architecture, and beyond. Existing strategies mostly resort to active, namely smart or field responsive, materials, which undergo a change of their physical properties when subjected to an external stimulus Their ability for shape morphing is intrinsic to the atomic/molecular structure as well as the mechanochemical interactions of their constituents. Most active materials, especially shape memory polymers, respond with an on-off switch of deformation at a transition temperature set through chemical recipes, and their performance typically degrades steadily under thermomechanical cycles. This characteristic may pose limits of application in regimes operating with temperature-fluctuating stress, where actuation is sought through successive heating/cooling cycles. Most of them are periodic with a paucity featuring spatial heterogeneity in flat thin sheets[45] and textured metamaterials[51], but they all cannot respond to an external stimulus since an external force is needed to induce morphing
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