Structure, design and mechanics of a pop-up origami with cuts

Abstract: Rotational erection system (RES) represents an origami-based design method for generating a three-dimensional (3D) structure from a planar sheet without compression. Its rotational and translational kinematics is fully encoded in a form of prescribed cuts and folds that has only zero degrees of freedom in the geometric limit. Here we characterize mechanical and geometric properties of a threefold symmetric RES by combining finite element numerical simulation and physical experiment. We demonstrate that a plate bending in RES creates a physical route connecting the two energetically separated configurations, i.e., flat and standing states, allowing RES to morph into a 3D shape via a snap-through transition. We quantify the energy barrier for the bistability and show that it is independent of the entire span of the structure but depends only on its aspect ratio, indicating that the bistability of RES is essentially scale independent. The scale-free and tunable nature of the emergent bistability will be potentially useful in a range of applications including switching devices, energy-adsorbing mechanical systems, and one-step construction in architectures. The present study clarifies the basic actuation mechanism of an origami-based deployable structure extended with chiral patterned cuts, opening up the way for the use of optimally designed RES in a range of man-made systems.