Energy Landscape and Stability of Origami-Inspired Deployable Structures

科学家、数学家和工程师对将折纸艺术转化为创新的工程设计产生了浓厚的兴趣，利用其独特的特性来创造具有可调特性的可展开结构。为了充分利用折纸在展开中的范例能力，有两个基本的力学问题需要深入研究，即折纸结构的变形和稳定性。在这方面，该奖项支持研究折纸结构的能量景观和研究可变形折纸结构的稳定性的基础研究。对上述问题的成功研究将使折纸在更广泛的应用中得到应用，包括航空航天和民用应用的可展开结构、植入式医疗设备、日常必需品和玩具。因此，本研究将促进折纸科学和工程的进步，促进国家的健康、繁荣和福利。除了研究活动，教育和推广计划旨在使广泛的群体受益，从通过与当地学区和科学中心合作的K-12学生，到通过大学研究计划的本科生，再到通过先进的教学和研究的研究生。可部署性一直是研究折纸结构的主要动机之一。有一些努力，以了解部署过程的机制使用折纸作为灵感。然而，展开结构的稳定性尚未得到研究，并且根据文献报道，展开的折纸结构可能会沿着展开路径崩溃。本研究试图通过研究可变形折纸结构的稳定性来填补这一空白。具体来说，它将关注部署和折叠流程应该采用两条不同的路径。本文将开发一个通用的、鲁棒的有限元平台，用于研究可变形折纸图案的能量格局，并研究折纸结构的各种稳定性现象，包括：双稳态、多稳态和可调多稳态。从能源景观/稳定性研究中获得的平台和知识也将用于通过各种折纸结构（从1D管状结构、2D板状结构和3D结构）的异质集成，创造具有可调可展开性和可折叠性的新型折纸灵感超材料。该奖项反映了美国国家科学基金会的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的知识价值和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。

Scientists, mathematicians, and engineers are leading a vigorous interest to transform origami from the art of paper folding to innovative engineering design for harnessing its unique properties to create deployable structures with tunable properties. To fully harness origami's exemplar capabilities in deployment, there are two fundamental mechanics problems that need to be thoroughly studied, namely, deformation and stability of deployed origami structures. In this regard, this award supports fundamental research to investigate the energy landscapes of origami structures and to study the stability of the deformable origami structures. Successful investigations of the above problems will bring origami to be used in much broader applications, ranging from deployable structures for aerospace and civil applications, implantable medical devices, daily essentials, and toys. As a result, this research will promote the progress of the science and engineering of origami, and advance the national health, prosperity, and welfare. In addition to the research activities, the education and outreach programs aim to benefit a broad range of groups, from K-12 students through partnership with the local school district and science center and undergraduates through a university research initiative to graduate students through advanced teaching and research.Deployability has been one of the main motivations to study origami structures. There are some efforts to understand the mechanisms for the deploying process using paper folding as inspiration. However, the stability of the deployed structure has not been studied yet and, as reported in the literature, a deployed origami structure can potentially collapse along the deploying path. This research attempts to fill this gap by studying the stability of deformable origami structures. Specifically, it will focus on the idea that deploying and collapsing processes should take two different paths. A versatile and robust finite element platform will be developed to study the energy landscape of deformable origami patterns and investigate various stability phenomena of origami structures, including: bistable, multi-stable, and tunable multi-stable states. The platform and knowledge gained from the energy landscape/stability study will also be used to create new origami-inspired metamaterials with tunable deployability and collapsibility through heterogeneous integration of various origami structures, ranging from 1D tubular structures, 2D plates, and 3D structures.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.