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Pneumatic soft robots have several advantages, including facile fabrication, versatile deformation modes, and safe human–machine interaction. However, pneumatic soft robots typically rely on mechatronics to interact with their environment, which can limit their form factors and reliability. Researchers have considered how to achieve autonomous behaviors using the principles of mechanical computing and physical intelligence. Herein, modular responsive valves that can autonomously regulate airflow within pneumatic soft robots in response to various environmental stimuli, including light, water, and mechanical forces, are described. By combining multiple types of valves, autonomous logic gates and more advanced logical operations can be realized. Finally, it is demonstrated that responsive valves can be integrated with pneumatic soft robots, allowing autonomous morphing and navigation. This framework provides a strategy for creating autonomous pneumatic robots that can respond to multiple stimuli in their environment. 

Abstract This is a roadmap article with multiple contributors on different aspects of embodying intelligence and computing in the mechanical domain of functional materials and structures. Overall, an IOP roadmap article is a broad, multi-author review with leaders in the field discussing the latest developments, commissioned by the editorial board. The intention here is to cover various topics of adaptive structural and material systems with mechano-intelligence in the overall roadmap, with twelve sections in total. These sections cover topics from materials to devices to systems, such as computational metamaterials, neuromorphic materials, mechanical and material logic, mechanical memory, soft matter computing, physical reservoir computing, wave-based computing, morphological computing, mechanical neural networks, plant-inspired intelligence, pneumatic logic circuits, intelligent robotics, and embodying mechano-intelligence for engineering functionalities via physical computing.  In this paper, we view all the 2-page sections with equal contributions to the overall roadmap article and thus list the authorship on the front page via alphabetical order of their last names.  On the other hand, for each individual section, the authors decide on their own the order of authorship.  

Abstract Architected materials exhibit unique properties and functionalities based on the geometric arrangement of their constituent materials. In most cases, these parameters are fixed, requiring that the system be redesigned and reconstructed if different properties are desired. Both stimuli‐responsive materials and modular designs have been used to enable re‐programmable properties in the past, but often have limitations, such as the need for a continuous application of external stimuli or power, or unwanted global morphing. In this study, a locally stable anti‐tetra chiral (LSAT) metamaterial is introduced consisting of independently multistable units that can deform and change state without inducing changes in the global morphology. Adjacent cells are only weakly coupled, allowing the collective metamaterial to be switched between many different possible states. Local bistability enables re‐programmable heterogeneity, such as the snapping of cells along an edge or diagonally within the architected material. Utilizing finite element analysis (FEA), the influence of key geometric parameters on the re‐programmability of the metamaterials is systematically investigated. The effect of these parameters on properties such as shear stiffness, Poisson's ratio, and vibration are also investigated using experimental prototypes. This re‐programmable metamaterial promises to expand the design space for mechanical systems, with potential applications in non‐traditional computation, robotic actuation, and adaptive structures.