"Kirigami: Ancient Japanese Art Inspires Ultrastrong, Lightweight Engineering Materials"
MIT engineers have used the ancient Japanese art of kirigami to create high-performance architected materials called plate lattices. By modifying a common origami crease pattern, the researchers were able to fabricate ultralight and ultrastrong structures from metal or other materials with custom shapes and tailored mechanical properties. The kirigami technique allows for the mass production of these structures, making them potentially useful in architectural, airplane, automotive, or aerospace components. The researchers also plan to develop user-friendly CAD design tools for these structures and explore methods to reduce computational costs for simulating desired properties.