In my lab we work on designing and
fabricating novel materials and
structures. A large number of
mathematicians and computer scientists,
engineers, are working on origami
nowadays. So imagine that you are going
to use this origami structure as an impact
protection layer and you are applying
let's say, a hammer impact on one side.
The compression wave will eventually change
into a decompression wave while it's
moving through this chain.
So this video clip shows... at the beginning of the
impact we have this red color formed due
to the compression, but immediately after
that we have a blue color due to the
bouncing back motion of the origami unit
cell. But what is interesting is
at a certain point we see the blue colour ahead
of the red colour. What you are going to feel
on the other side of the structure is that
re-bouncing motion first, instead of the
compressive force. So what you are going
to feel on the other side is more like
pulling motion instead of compressive
motion.
The applications can be abundant-
for example, delivering a package using a
drone. You want to protect your medium
from the impact from the ground.
Another example can be a landing structure.
We can convert
compression to tension so your whole
structure can be well protected against
the impact.
When I have visitors from outside
and they look at
this variety of origami, they are just
amazed to see how this interesting
origami can be integrated into
state-of-the-art research. When we were
starting this project the mechanism
seemed so counter-intuitive, so we were so excited so
thrilled because we were not even sure
this can really happen.
