We present a theorem on the compatibility upon deployment of kirigami tessellations restricted on a spherical surface with patterned cuts forming freeform quadrilateral meshes. We show that the spherical kirigami tessellations have either one or two compatible states, i.e., there are at most two isolated strain-free configurations along the deployment path. The proof of the theorem is based on analyzing the number of roots of the compatibility condition, under which the kirigami pattern allows a piecewise isometric transformation between the undeployed and deployed configurations. As a degenerate case, the theorem further reveals that neutral equilibrium arises for planar quadrilateral kirigami tessellations if and only if the cuts form parallelogram voids. Our study provides new insights into the rational design of morphable structures based on Euclidean and non-Euclidean geometries.
Download