Analytical and numerical investigations of form-finding methods for tensegrity structures

The form-finding of tensegrity structures is a rapidly evolving scientific field in which the self-equilibrium of these statically indeterminate structures is established by the action of tension and compression. Computing the self-equilibrium geometry, aka form-finding, is an important first step for the analysis of tensegrity structures. These structures have atttracted the attention of mathematicians and engineers alike, because self-stressed and self-equilibrated structures can be seen as closed systems consisting of massless nodes with pairwise attraction and repulsion forces. It is a model that appears in several fields ranging from active structures and sculptures to mathematical rigidity and cytoskeletons.