A rugged lithium‐ion battery (LIB) can be realized without any new material development through selective material matching based on localized deformation of a substrate induced by its well‐designed pattern. In particular, an auxetic cut flexible substrate accommodates various complex deformations and adaptive conformations through the hinge joints because the external force is highly localized in the hinges while the segmented motifs remain almost undeformed. The embedded LIB cells in undeformed regions of the auxetic cut silicon rubber sheet do not undergo large deformation, maintaining their battery performance regardless of loading conditions via the pattern‐associated deformation mechanism. The hierarchy and number of segmentations are the key parameters of the deformation mechanism for auxetic cut shape‐reconfigurable battery systems. The numerically and experimentally proven strategy that utilizes strain gradients induced by a patterned substrate as a design guideline for material matching can lead to various wearable and conformable designs without sacrificing the functionality and durability of electronic devices.
We propose an algorithmic framework of a pluripotent structure evolving from a simple compact structure into diverse complex 3D structures for designing the shape-transformable, reconfigurable, and deployable structures and robots. Our algorithmic approach suggests a way of transforming a compact structure consisting of uniform building blocks into a large, desired 3D shape. Analogous to a fertilized egg cell that can grow into a preprogrammed shape according to coded information, compactly stacked panels named the zygote structure can evolve into arbitrary 3D structures by programming their connection path. Our stacking algorithm obtains this coded sequence by inversely stacking the voxelized surface of the desired structure into a tree. Applying the connection path obtained by the stacking algorithm, the compactly stacked panels named the zygote structure can be deployed into diverse large 3D structures. We conceptually demonstrated our pluripotent evolving structure by energy-releasing commercial spring hinges and thermally actuated shape memory alloy hinges, respectively. We also show that the proposed concept enables the fabrication of large structures in a significantly smaller workspace.
Despite
the increase in demand for deformable electrochemical capacitors
as a power source for wearable electronics, significant obstacles
remain in developing these capacitors, including their manufacturing
complexity and insufficient deformability. With recognition of these
challenges, a facile strategy is proposed to fabricate large-scale,
lightweight, and mechanically robust composite electrodes composed
of ruthenium nanoparticles embedded in freestanding carbon nanotube
(CNT)-based nanosheets (Ru@a-CNTs). Surface-modified CNT sheets with
hierarchical porous structures can behave as an ideal platform to
accommodate a large number of uniformly distributed Ru nanoparticles
(Ru/CNT weight ratio of 5:1) while improving compatibility with aqueous
electrolytes. Accordingly, Ru@a-CNTs offer a large electrochemically
active area, showing a high specific capacitance (∼253.3 F
g–1) and stability for over 2000 cycles. More importantly,
the exceptional performance and mechanical durability of quasi-solid-state
capacitors assembled with Ru@a-CNTs and a PVA-H3PO4 hydrogel electrolyte are successfully demonstrated in that
94% of the initial capacitance is retained after 100 000 cycles
of bending deformation and a commercial smartwatch is charged by multiple
cells. The feasible large-scale production and potential applicability
shown in this study provide a simple and highly effective design strategy
for a wide range of energy storage applications from small- to large-scale
wearable electronics.
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