Morpho: A programmable environment for shape optimization and shape-shifting

Materials that change shape, often dramatically, are ubiquitous in soft matter physics and beyond. Determining their structure requires minimizing a given energy functional with respect to the shape of the domain and auxiliary fields describing the structure. Such shape optimization problems are very challenging to solve and there is a lack of suitable simulation tools that are both readily accessible and general purpose. We address this gap with Morpho, an open-source programmable environment for shape optimization and shape-shifting. Capable of simultaneously optimizing for shape and fields in any number of dimensions, Morpho can be used to model a host of soft matter systems and beyond. We showcase examples from diverse systems ranging from biological membranes, liquid crystal tactoids, constrained flexible filaments and swelling hydrogels.