Portable Flexible Spherical Origami Joule‐Heaters with Aerogel

Abstract

Trending portable smart devices are providing great convenience to the daily life. Thermal conductivity is efficient for contact heat transfer. Unfortunately, existing rigid surfaces can hardly heat objects in arbitrary shapes. Herein, a flexible origami‐structure heater fabricated by scalable laser manufacturing with temperature feedback control is proposed. The thin film origami heater is designed as a pair of semispherical origami patterns, which can conform to the curved surface of food samples more effectively. Therefore, the heat conducting area is increased to generate a fast and even heating profile to the surface of the food samples. The outer aerogel provides high thermal insulation to prevent heat dissipation in the environment. As proof of concept, the heating device can cook quail eggs within 3 minutes at a constant temperature of 100 °C. The power consumption of this heater is as low as 18 W, which standard portable chargers can power. This work significantly promotes the usability of portable heaters for cooking spherical objects, providing more conveniences during outdoor hiking and even in outer space where water‐boiling is impossible without atmosphere and gravity.