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Recently, multi-stable origami structures and material systems have shown promising potentials to achieve multi-functionality. Especially, origami folding is fundamentally a three-dimensional mechanism, which imparts unique capabilities not seen in the more traditional multi-stable systems. This paper proposes and analytically examines a multi-stable origami cellular structure that can exhibit asymmetric energy barriers and a mechanical diode behavior in compression. Such a structure consists of many stacked Miura-ori sheets of different folding stiffness and accordion-shaped connecting sheets, and it can be divided into unit cells that features two different stable equilibria. To understand the desired diode behavior, this study focuses on two adjacent unit cells and examines how folding can create a kinematic constraint onto the deformation of these two cells. Via estimating the elastic potential energy landscape of this dual cell system. we find that the folding-induced kinematic constraint can significantly increase the potential energy barrier for compressing the dual-cell structure from a certain stable state to another, however, the same constraint would not increase the energy barrier of the opposite extension switch. As a result, one needs to apply a large force to compress the origami cellular structure but only a small force to stretch it, hence a mechanical diode behavior. Results of this study can open new possibilities for achieving structural motion rectifying, wave propagation control, and embedded mechanical computation.
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Harnessing the anisotropic multistability of stacked-origami mechanical metamaterials for effective modulus programming
This study examines a three-dimensional, anisotropic multistability of a mechanical meta material based on a stacked Miura-ori architecture, and investigates how such a unique stability property can impart stiffness and effective modulus programming functions. The unit cell of this metamaterial can be bistable due to the nonlinear relationship between rigid-folding and crease material bending. Such bistability possesses an unorthodox property: the arrangement of elastically stable and unstable equilibria are different along different principal axes of the unit cell, so that along certain axes the unit cell exhibits two force–deformation relationships concurrently within the same range of deformation. Therefore, one can achieve a notable stiffness adaptation via switching between the two stable states. As multiple unit cells are assembled into a metamaterial, the stiffness adaptation can be aggregated into an on-demand modulus programming capability. That is, via strategically switching different unit cells between stable states, one can control the overall effective modulus. This research examines the underlying principles of anisotropic multistability, experimentally validates the feasibility of stiffness adaptation, and conducts parametric analyses to reveal the correlations between the effective modulus programming and Miura-ori designs. The results can advance many adaptive systems such as morphing structures and soft robotics.
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- Award ID(s):
- 1633952
- PAR ID:
- 10547831
- Publisher / Repository:
- SAGE Publications
- Date Published:
- Journal Name:
- Journal of Intelligent Material Systems and Structures
- Volume:
- 29
- Issue:
- 14
- ISSN:
- 1045-389X
- Format(s):
- Medium: X Size: p. 2933-2945
- Size(s):
- p. 2933-2945
- Sponsoring Org:
- National Science Foundation
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