Golden‐Ratio–Guided Aperiodic Architected Metamaterials with Simultaneously Enhanced Strength and Toughness

Abstract Architected lattice metamaterials offer tunable, exceptional mechanical performance through precisely engineered microarchitectures, yet an intrinsic trade‐off between strength and toughness remains a fundamental design challenge. Here, a class of aperiodic architected metamaterials guided by the golden ratio ‐ a geometric principle emblematic of natural balance and structural harmony—is introduced to overcome this limitation. The concept is validated via additive manufacturing of conventional periodic, hierarchical periodic, and golden‐ratio‐guided aperiodic lattices, along with their interpenetrating phase composite (IPC) counterparts. The aperiodic architectures exhibit significantly enhanced damage tolerance under monotonic loading, with increases of 84.24% and 42.45% in ultimate load, and 277.43% and 128.13% in initial fracture energy, for the lattice and IPC metamaterials, respectively. Under cyclic loading, only the aperiodic IPC withstands five tensile cycles at 350 N before incurring damage, whereas all other architectures fail during the initial cycle. These improvements stem from the unification of local geometric heterogeneity and global order in the golden‐ratio‐guided aperiodic architecture, which alleviates stress concentrations and promotes spatial delocalization of damage‐tolerence regions. As a result, crack paths become more tortuous and adaptive, enhancing energy dissipation and resistance to fracture. These findings establish golden‐ratio‐guided aperiodicity as a robust design paradigm for next‐generation damage‐tolerant metamaterials.

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Institutions

Publication Details

Journal
Advanced Functional Materials
Published
2025-11-22
DOI
https://doi.org/10.1002/adfm.202516315
Citations
8
Primary Topic
Cellular and Composite Structures
Type
article
Field-Weighted Citation Impact
5.71

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article

Golden‐Ratio–Guided Aperiodic Architected Metamaterials with Simultaneously Enhanced Strength and Toughness

Chee Kai Chua, Junjie Deng, Ke Yuan, Jia An et al.
8 citations
Advanced Functional Materials
Cellular and Composite Structures
5.71
article

Golden‐Ratio–Guided Aperiodic Architected Metamaterials with Simultaneously Enhanced Strength and Toughness

Chee Kai Chua, Junjie Deng, Ke Yuan, Jia An, Zhonggang Wang, Kai Liu, Xinxin Wang, Xinwei Li, Zhendong Li, Ruochao Zhao
article en
8 citations

Abstract

Abstract Architected lattice metamaterials offer tunable, exceptional mechanical performance through precisely engineered microarchitectures, yet an intrinsic trade‐off between strength and toughness remains a fundamental design challenge. Here, a class of aperiodic architected metamaterials guided by the golden ratio ‐ a geometric principle emblematic of natural balance and structural harmony—is introduced to overcome this limitation. The concept is validated via additive manufacturing of conventional periodic, hierarchical periodic, and golden‐ratio‐guided aperiodic lattices, along with their interpenetrating phase composite (IPC) counterparts. The aperiodic architectures exhibit significantly enhanced damage tolerance under monotonic loading, with increases of 84.24% and 42.45% in ultimate load, and 277.43% and 128.13% in initial fracture energy, for the lattice and IPC metamaterials, respectively. Under cyclic loading, only the aperiodic IPC withstands five tensile cycles at 350 N before incurring damage, whereas all other architectures fail during the initial cycle. These improvements stem from the unification of local geometric heterogeneity and global order in the golden‐ratio‐guided aperiodic architecture, which alleviates stress concentrations and promotes spatial delocalization of damage‐tolerence regions. As a result, crack paths become more tortuous and adaptive, enhancing energy dissipation and resistance to fracture. These findings establish golden‐ratio‐guided aperiodicity as a robust design paradigm for next‐generation damage‐tolerant metamaterials.

Advanced Functional Materials
Central South University (CN), Singapore University of Technology and Design (SG), National University of Singapore (SG), Wuhan University of Technology (CN), Wuhan University of Science and Technology (CN), Hubei University of Technology (CN), Newcastle University (GB)
National Natural Science Foundation of China, Natural Science Foundation of Hunan Province
Openalex Percentile: Top 3%
Cellular and Composite Structures
5.71
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