No Arabic abstract
Origami and crumpling are two extreme tools to shrink a 3-D shell. In the shrink/expand process, the former is reversible due to its topological mechanism, while the latter is irreversible because of its random-generated creases. We observe a morphological transition between origami and crumple states in a twisted cylindrical shell. By studying the regularity of crease pattern, acoustic emission and energetics from experiments and simulations, we develop a model to explain this transition from frustration of geometry that causes breaking of rotational symmetry. In contrast to solving von Karman-Donnell equations numerically, our model allows derivations of analytic formula that successfully describe the origami state. When generalized to truncated cones and polygonal cylinders, we explain why multiple and/or reversed crumple-origami transitions can occur.
Experimentally measuring the elastic properties of thin biological surfaces is non-trivial, particularly when they are curved. One technique that may be used is the indentation of a thin sheet of material by a rigid indenter, whilst measuring the applied force and displacement. This gives immediate information on the fracture strength of the material (from the force required to puncture), but it is also theoretically possible to determine the elastic properties by comparing the resulting force-displacement curves with a mathematical model. Existing mathematical studies generally assume that the elastic surface is initially flat, which is often not the case for biological membranes. We previously outlined a theory for the indentation of curved isotropic, incompressible, hyperelastic membranes (with no bending stiffness) which breaks down for highly curved surfaces, as the entire membrane becomes wrinkled. Here we introduce the effect of bending stiffness, ensuring that energy is required to change the shell shape without stretching, and find that commonly neglected terms in the shell equilibrium equation must be included. The theory presented here allows for the estimation of shape- and size-independent elastic properties of highly curved surfaces via indentation experiments, and is particularly relevant for biological surfaces.
It is shown that twisted $n$-layers have an intrinsic degree of freedom living on $2n$-tori, which is the phason supplied by the relative slidings of the layers and that the twist generates pseudo magnetic fields. As a result, twisted $n$-layers host intrinsic higher dimensional topological phases and those characterized by second Chern numbers can be found in a twisted bi-layer. Indeed, our investigation of phononic lattices with interactions modulated by a second twisted lattice reveals Hofstadter-like spectral butterflies in terms of the twist angle, whose gaps carry the predicted topological invariants. Our work demonstrates how multi-layered systems are virtual laboratories for studying the physics of higher dimensional quantum Hall effect and how to generate topological edge chiral modes by simply sliding the layers relative to each other. In the context of classical metamaterials, both photonic and phononic, these findings open a path to engineering topological pumping via simple twisting and sliding.
Inspired by the allure of additive fabrication, we pose the problem of origami design from a new perspective: how can we grow a folded surface in three dimensions from a seed so that it is guaranteed to be isometric to the plane? We solve this problem in two steps: by first identifying the geometric conditions for the compatible completion of two separate folds into a single developable four-fold vertex, and then showing how this foundation allows us to grow a geometrically compatible front at the boundary of a given folded seed. This yields a complete marching, or additive, algorithm for the inverse design of the complete space of developable quad origami patterns that can be folded from flat sheets. We illustrate the flexibility of our approach by growing ordered, disordered, straight and curved folded origami and fitting surfaces of given curvature with folded approximants. Overall, our simple shift in perspective from a global search to a local rule has the potential to transform origami-based meta-structure design.
Traditional origami starts from flat surfaces, leading to crease patterns consisting of Euclidean vertices. However, Euclidean vertices are limited in their folding motions, are degenerate, and suffer from misfolding. Here we show how non-Euclidean 4-vertices overcome these limitations by lifting this degeneracy, and that when the elasticity of the hinges is taken into account, non-Euclidean 4-vertices permit higher-order multistability. We harness these advantages to design an origami inverter that does not suffer from misfolding and to physically realize a tristable vertex.
Kagome antiferromagnets are known to be highly frustrated and degenerate when they possess simple, isotropic interactions. We consider the entire class of these magnets when their interactions are spatially anisotropic. We do so by identifying a certain class of systems whose degenerate ground states can be mapped onto the folding motions of a generalized spin origami two-dimensional mechanical sheet. Some such anisotropic spin systems, including Cs2ZrCu3F12, map onto flat origami sheets, possessing extensive degeneracy similar to isotropic systems. Others, such as Cs2CeCu3F12, can be mapped onto sheets with non-zero Gaussian curvature, leading to more mechanically stable corrugated surfaces. Remarkably, even such distortions do not always lift the entire degeneracy, instead permitting a large but sub-extensive space of zero-energy modes. We show that for Cs2CeCu3F12, due to an additional point group symmetry associated with structure, these modes are Dirac line nodes with a double degeneracy protected by a topological invariant. The existence of mechanical analogs thus serves to identify and explicate the robust degeneracy of the spin systems.