Desired Stiffness Verification on Programmable MEMS Metamaterial

This abstract discusses a novel MEMS thermal actuator that is incorporated within lattice-like structure that can change its stiffness on demand. Our experiments show that this actuator can achieve any desired stiffness, from highly negative stiffnesses all the way up to infinite positive stiffnesses, within 100 milliseconds. We also demonstrate that this design with closed loop control is robust to changes in external forces or stimuli. This discovery highlights how tunable stiffness metamaterials could be designed and fabricated practically for applications such as medical tools that adapt during surgery, car parts that reduce vibrations, and materials that work better for certain technologies like moving mirrors or switches.