Yinding Chi

Abstract Mechanical metamaterials achieve multistep, programmable responses through sequential deformation driven by snapping instabilities, yet these sequences are typically governed by unavoidable imperfections, resulting in random and uncontrollable behavior. Here, we harness intra- and interlayer magnetic interactions coupled with elasticity to reprogram the ordering of sequential buckling instabilities in kirigami-inspired soft magnetic metamaterials.

Abstract Snapping, driven by stored elastic energy, enables versatile and rapid shape changes in nature; yet replicating such autonomous, reprogrammable morphogenesis in free-standing volumetric structures remains elusive. Here we report a lantern-shaped ribbon-cluster meta-unit that harnesses programmable and reprogrammable elastic energy to achieve over 13 distinct volumetric snapping morphologies from a single unit.