| Abstract |
We are witnessing an explosive growth in the tools available to create flexible metamaterials with controllable mechanical functionalities, such as patterned elastica, self folding polymer sheets and soft robots. This toolbox allows one to design materials with new functionalities – in principle. In practice, most interesting functionalities have been found by accident, as the link between the structure and functionality of metamaterials is highly nontrivial. We propose to develop evolutionary algorithms for the purposeful design of flexible metamaterials: materials with unusual mechanical properties, materials that tune their mechanical properties in response to external stimuli, and self healing materials. |
