Compression behavior of a cell of a tetrachiral metamaterial with regular and irregular structure

Metamaterials are materials whose unique properties are associated with their geometric structure rather than the chemical composition of the base material. These properties can be influenced at various scales but this work focuses on a cell’s topological defect. Samples for mechanical testing were printed using digital light processing lithography technology. One of the characteristics studied in this work is the rotation of the cell’s face under uniaxial loading. For both the regular cell and the cell with topological defect, the rotation was directed clockwise, which corresponds to the direction of twisting of the structures on the lateral faces. The maximum twisting angle of the regular cell is 0.84°. The introduction of topological defect reduced the twist angle of the cell by more than 30%. It was found that the force value in the cell with a topological defect is higher, indicating that the cell with the defect is more rigid than the cell without it.