Soft electronic systems are often designed by prioritizing materials compliance and electrical performance, with mechanics treated primarily as a constraint to be mitigated. This talk introduces a complementary perspective in which continuum mechanical fields are elevated to active design and control variables for soft electronics. The presentation will highlight recent work across haptics, wearables, bio-integrated devices, shape morphing systems and fliers, showing how distributed mechanics can be harnessed to shape electronic sensors and actuators. Examples include mechanics-mediated control of vibrotactile perception in wearable haptic systems, full-field characterization of skin–device interfaces, mock circulating loop systems, and flow-coupled soft electronic fliers and floaters that exploit fluid–structure interactions for stability and sensing. Shape-morphing soft systems will be discussed as programmable mechanical architectures, where geometry and deformation pathways dynamically reconfigure electrical behavior and system-level response.

Across these platforms, a unifying theme is the use of full-field experimental mechanics and computer-vision-based measurements to reveal spatiotemporal mechanical dynamics that are invisible to conventional pointwise metrics. By treating soft electronics as nonlinear, distributed mechanical systems operating in real environments, this work demonstrates how mechanics-driven design principles enable new modes of functionality, interpretability, and robustness beyond what material softness alone can provide.