MetaLab Research Group

Generative models struggle with kirigami

We are seeing an enormous progress in generative models. Take a look at Midjourney, Dall-E, Stable Diffusion and very recently Sora from OpenAI. It is not surprising that similar approaches become popular for designing structures and metamaterials. But why don’t we see generative models capable of creating kirigami metamaterials? After struggling for more than two years, Gerrit pinpoints the exact reason for it and also highlights some “survivorship bias” existing in modern literature on the generative models for metamaterials. If you want to learn more, take a look at our preprint here.

Our paper is published in Acta Mechanica

Our short and quite neat paper has been published in Acta Mechanica. Led by Indre Jödicke, this research project takes a somewhat different perspective on truss-based metamaterials. With advancements in additive manufacturing, the components of these metamaterials are becoming increasingly smaller, occasionally too small for reliable fabrication. Our study explores whether slight alterations in lattice geometry can circumvent these fabrication challenges. Using a minimal viable case, we demonstrate that sometimes being anisotropic is actually good 🙂 Check out the paper here.

Congratulations to all the co-authors for pushing this project forward despite numerous challenges along the way. It has been an interesting journey that began with an overambitious goal, which was amended as we gained a better understanding of the problem. A priceless learning experience indeed!

What a nice start of the year!

It’s very nice to start the New Year with a paper in Science! Check out (https://lnkd.in/etjcgi9Q) our perspective paper by Lars Pastewka and me, in which we comment on the amazing manuscript by Antoine Aymard, Emilie Delplanque, Davy Dalmas, and Julien Scheibert (https://lnkd.in/eWfcAm3y). They’ve developed a very inspiring and robust way of designing friction metainterfaces using asperities with different heights. We hint at the future of frictional metainterfaces, drawing insights from the evolution of mechanical metamaterials.

Another paper in Materials & Design!

I am happy to share with you David’s first paper devoted to metamaterials with switchable auxeticity. The trick is simple—just exploit self-contact between elements to trigger topological changes! What can we do with this effect? Check out our paper or watch the video below!

We love curves! And publish papers about them 🙂

I’m excited to share that my paper titled “Bandgap Structure in Elastic Metamaterials with Curvy Bezier Beams” has been successfully published in the special issue “Fundamentals and Applications of Metamaterials: Breaking the Limits” of Applied Physics Letters. Here, I examined how altering the geometry of beams in lattice-based metamaterials can affect the tunability of bandgaps.. An intriguing revelation from this research is the clear differentiation in how different frequency ranges react to changes in beam geometry. To get a better idea what is shown in the figure below, I invite you to explore my manuscript available here.

My new class of “Machine Learning in Structural Mechanics” totally rocks!

This semester, Mr. Gerrit Felsch and I collaborated to develop an entirely new course centered around the application of Machine Learning in Structural Mechanics. The course comprises 13 lectures and 12 practical sessions, all aimed at providing students with a comprehensive understanding of modern ML methods and enabling them to implement these techniques for various challenges within materials science, mechanical engineering, and civil engineering. Following the students’ feedback and evaluations, we are thrilled to announce the resounding success of our dedicated efforts. The average grade achieved falls within the range of 1.2-1.4, indicating an exceptionally high level of performance. Additionally, more than 80% of the students have nominated me for the “Teaching Award,” which is truly gratifying. You can find the whole evaluation here. Stay tuned for more news and, perhaps, online lectures on Youtube.

A heartfelt thank you goes out to Gerrit for his invaluable contributions to the development of this course!

Another paper published!

Our paper “Controlling auxeticity in curved-beam metamaterials via a deep generative model” has been published in esteem journal of “Computer Methods in Applied Mechanics and Engineering”. Here we propose a deep generative model enabling us to efficiently design various metamaterials. Congratulations to Gerrit with his first first-author publication! Well done! You can find pdf here.

New manuscript

Our brief perspective paper, in collaboration with Dr. Falk Tauber, has been published in “Frontiers in Robotics and AI”. Here we discuss the challenges of soft robotics from the perspective of researchers who are relatively new in this field, presenting both positive and negative aspects of current trends in soft robots.

How does this robot crawl up?

Together with Mr. Aryan Rana, we 3D-printed this interesting robot. Can you guess what drives its motion?

Success of MasterLab Program

Ms. Kajal Jain and Mr. Baris Erol for last six months have been working on small but very exiting projects in our lab. Baris studied propagation of the elastic waves in tillable metamaterials. Kajal developed an automated setup enabling us to study interaction between multiple permanent magnets and self-assembly on mesoscale level. Thanks both of you for your dedication and awesome results!

Laboratory on the News

Our research and recently initiated Spaghetti Project were highlighted on the news! Check out this episode

Spaghetti Project

As the part of Freiburger Wissenschaftsmarkt we presented a public science “Spaghetti-Project”! Everyone can contribute to this project by performing simple experiment at home and submitting the results. If we gather enough data, you will be a co-author of the scientific manuscript!

Check out the details of this project here