Towards a theory of self-folding

The physics of self-assembly of particles, self-folding of protein polymers and self-folding of sheets are very different. However, the design question shows striking similarities across these fields. In all of these fields, a given program (e.g., a protein sequence or a crease pattern) can generally fold into many undesired structures or kinetic traps. Conversely, many different programs can fold into the same desired structure. Hence, a common challenge is finding the best program to robustly achieve a given structure in the real world. Here, we generalize lessons learned in protein folding and self-assembly in a way that applies to folding sheets. We draw parallels to recent results for sheets by various researchers. We highlight ideas that have not yet been explored for sheets such as heterogeneous folding stiffness, controlled nucleation and multi-functional adaptive designs.