In good agreement with the experiment, the theore�cal model predicts the most prominent aspects of the deforma�on: as the structure is driven to the isotropic state, it contracts in the direc�on of the nema�c director, and it expands in the perpendicular plane in order to meet the constraint of volume conserva�on. In the case of pris�ne alignment, the perpendicular plane to the director is parallel to the substrate, so the structure expands in both direc�ons of this plane. In contrast, the perpendicular plane to the director in the presence of PDMS scaffolding is parallel to the scaffold, so the structure accordingly expands along the plane of the channel and contracts in the orthogonal direc�on. Thus, the simula�ons allow for a precise interpreta�on of the experimental deforma�on -it is a direct consequence of the interplay between the contrac�on along the programmed molecular orienta�on caused by the phase transi�on and the incompressibility requirement. As the next step, we designed a more complex microactuator consis�ng of a free rota�ng gripper (40 × 40 × 30 µm³) (Figure ). As expected, while symmetric actua�on was observed for the "pris�ne" sample without influence of the PDMS, the actua�ng behavior of the gripper within PDMS-X and PDMS-Y was clearly asymmetric and dependent on the posi�on of the scaffolds (Figure , Supplementary Movie 1). In par�cular, the arms parallel to the PDMS channels were more deformed than the one perpendicular to them, demonstra�ng the influence of alignment due to the presence of the PDMS. More interes�ng was the effect of the rotated director field by having PDMS scaffolds at 45°. Instead of adhering to the originally programmed orthogonal cross design, the rotated channel induced a diagonal skew in the gripper's configura�on. In this configura�on, the gripper's two arms were ini�ally posi�oned closely to each other, with each poin�ng towards one side of the PDMS surface. During the hea�ng process, the gripper displayed a scissor-like movement with its arms