In the longer term, tunable cracks could become standard building blocks —the “transistors” of structural engineering—enabling buildings that self‑adjust stiffness in response to wind, wearables that modulate breathability, and implants that release drugs on command.
| Topic | Representative Papers (Open‑Access) | |-------|--------------------------------------| | | “Mechanically programmable crack paths in liquid‑crystal elastomers” – Nat. Commun. (2020) – [PDF on arXiv] | | Self‑Healing Crack Control | “Reversible crack propagation in supramolecular polymers” – Adv. Funct. Mater. (2021) – [Free PDF] | | Computational Design of Crack Paths | “Topology optimization for tunable fracture” – J. Mech. Phys. Solids (2022) – [Free pre‑print] | | Applications in Soft Robotics | “Programmable fracture for shape‑changing soft robots” – Soft Robotics (2023) – [Publisher free‑access after registration] | tunecable crack