Molding a Shape-Memory Polymer with Programmable Matter Florian Pescher 1 , Benoˆ ıt Piranda 1 , Stephane Delalande 2 , and Julien Bourgeois 1 1 FEMTO-ST Institute, Univ. Bourgogne Franche-Comt´ e, CNRS, 1 Cours Leprince-Ringuet - 25200 Montb´ eliard, France {florian.pescher, benoit.piranda, julien.bourgeois}@femto-st.fr 2 PSA Groupe, Scientific Direction 2 Route de Gizy - 78943 V´ elizy-Villacoublay, France stephane.delalande@mpsa.com Abstract. The design phase of a car development is a long and tedious process requiring a lot of trials and errors. In this paper, we introduce a new concept aiming at making this process easier and more interactive. Our solution mixes self-reconfigurable autonomous robots forming pro- grammable matter and a shape-memory polymer surface that produces an interactive model of the desired object. We propose a global algorithm to manage the interactions with the users and the self-reconfiguration of programmable matter to mold the polymer surface. We detail the tech- nical aspects used to define the new shape of the programmable matter to better approach a goal surface described by a Non-Uniform Rational Basis Splines (NURBS) using a dichotomy algorithm. 1 Introduction Nowadays, during the design phase of car development, a lot of time is used creating prototypes to prepare the final style of the new vehicle. While realizing a Computer Aided Design (CAD) of the shape, handmade physical objects made from clay are still used in order to design the most crucial parts of a car. To reduce and to optimize this fastidious work, we would like to replace the physical clay with a more interactive system based on programmable matter. The matter we have in mind will be a help for CAD tools, able to display on real matter an object being designed. Interactions with the real object or the CAD model will automatically be reproduced on the other one. Thus, a designer will be able to design an object by hand or with a CAD software and restart this process as many times as needed. This matter will be composed of an ensemble of robots able to move by themselves around the others and equipped with a processing unit allowing them to perform calculations in order to plan their movements and achieve the desired shape. However, to realize this vision only with a modular robot, a huge amount of modules is going to be necessary. To simplify the concept and to have a smooth surface, we cover the modules with a fabric able to modify its shape and recover its initial form. The most appropriate material to answer our needs is a shape-memory polymer (SMP). SMP will be heated to mold the