LAUSR

Significance Origami has been employed to build deployable mechanical metamaterials through folding and unfolding along the crease lines. These deployable structures are flexible in their deployment direction so that they can be easily collapsed along the same path they are deployed. Here we create an origami-inspired mechanical metamaterial with on-demand deployability and selective collapsibility: autonomous deployability from the collapsed state and selective collapsibility along two different paths, with low stiffness for one path and substantially high stiffness for another path. The created mechanical metamaterial yields load-bearing capability in the deployed direction while still possessing great deployability and collapsibility. The principle in this work can be utilized to design and create versatile origami-inspired mechanical metamaterials that can find many applications. Origami has been employed to build deployable mechanical metamaterials through folding and unfolding along the crease lines. Deployable metamaterials are usually flexible, particularly along their deploying and collapsing directions, which unfortunately in many cases leads to an unstable deployed state, i.e., small perturbations may collapse the structure along the same deployment path. Here we create an origami-inspired mechanical metamaterial with on-demand deployability and selective collapsibility through energy analysis. This metamaterial has autonomous deployability from the collapsed state and can be selectively collapsed along two different paths, embodying low stiffness for one path and substantially high stiffness for another path. The created mechanical metamaterial yields load-bearing capability in the deployed direction while possessing great deployability and collapsibility. The principle in this work can be utilized to design and create versatile origami-inspired mechanical metamaterials that can find many applications.