Counting and Sequential Information Processing in Mechanical Metamaterials

Physical Review Letters, vol. 130, pp. 268204

Abstract

Materials with an irreversible response to cyclic driving exhibit an evolving internal state which, in principle, encodes information on the driving history. Here we realize irreversible metamaterials that count mechanical driving cycles and store the result into easily interpretable internal states. We extend these designs to aperiodic metamaterials that are sensitive to the order of different driving magnitudes, and realize "lock and key" metamaterials that only reach a specific state for a given target driving sequence. Our metamaterials are robust, scalable, and extendable, give insight into the transient memories of complex media, and open new routes towards smart sensing, soft robotics, and mechanical information processing.

Authors 2

1. Lennard J. Kwakernaak Aachen Huygens-Kamerlingh Onnes Laboratory

   Leiden University · Institute for Atomic and Molecular Physics

   Affiliation as printed

   Huygens-Kamerlingh Onnes Laboratory, Universiteit Leiden, PO Box 9504, 2300 RA Leiden, Netherlands and AMOLF, Science Park 104, 1098 XG Amsterdam, Netherlands

2. Martin van Hecke Aachen Huygens-Kamerlingh Onnes Laboratory

   Leiden University · Institute for Atomic and Molecular Physics

   Affiliation as printed

   Huygens-Kamerlingh Onnes Laboratory, Universiteit Leiden, PO Box 9504, 2300 RA Leiden, Netherlands and AMOLF, Science Park 104, 1098 XG Amsterdam, Netherlands