Multimodal steerable earthworm-inspired soft robot based on vacuum and positive pressure powered pneumatic actuators

Li, Pengcheng; Chen, Baojun; Liu, Jianbin

doi:10.1088/1748-3190/ad089c

Cited by 3 publications

(1 citation statement)

References 33 publications

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“…Typically, perisaltic robots are designed with multiple segments, each of which contains actuators that elongate or contract sequentially [1]. For example, commonly used extensional pneumatic actuators generate segment elongation when pressurized [13][14][15][16][17]. Similarly, actuatable materials such as nitinol wires [18,19] or polymers [20] respond to heat by contracting or bending.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Nodes for modes: Nodal honeycomb metamaterial enables a soft robot with multimodal locomotion

Dikici,

Daltorio,

Akkus

2024

Bioinspir. Biomim.

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Soft-bodied animals, such as worms and snakes, use many muscles in different ways to traverse unstructured environments and inspire tools for accessing confined spaces. They demonstrate versatility of locomotion which is essential for adaptation to changing terrain conditions. However, replicating such versatility in untethered soft-bodied robots with multimodal locomotion capabilities have been challenging due to complex fabrication processes and limitations of soft body structures to accommodate hardware such as actuators, batteries and circuit boards. Here, we present MetaCrawler, a 3D printed metamaterial soft robot designed for multimodal and omnidirectional locomotion. Our design approach facilitated an easy fabrication process through a discrete assembly of a modular nodal honeycomb lattice with soft and hard components. A crucial benefit of the nodal honeycomb architecture is the ability of its hard components, nodes, to accommodate a distributed actuation system, comprising servomotors, control circuits, and batteries. Enabled by this distributed actuation, MetaCrawler achieves five locomotion modes: peristalsis, sidewinding, sideways translation, turn-in-place, and anguilliform. Demonstrations showcase MetaCrawler’s adaptability in confined channel navigation, vertical traversing, and maze exploration. This soft robotic system holds the potential to offer easy-to-fabricate and accessible solutions for multimodal locomotion in applications such as search and rescue, pipeline inspection, and space missions.

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Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Nodes for modes: Nodal honeycomb metamaterial enables a soft robot with multimodal locomotion

Dikici,

Daltorio,

Akkus

2024

Bioinspir. Biomim.

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Enhancing efficiency and propulsion in bio-mimetic robotic fish through end-to-end deep reinforcement learning

Cui,

Sun,

Zhu

et al. 2024

Physics of Fluids

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Aquatic organisms are known for their ability to generate efficient propulsion with low energy expenditure. While existing research has sought to leverage bio-inspired structures to reduce energy costs in underwater robotics, the crucial role of control policies in enhancing efficiency has often been overlooked. In this study, we optimize the motion of a bio-mimetic robotic fish using deep reinforcement learning (DRL) to maximize propulsion efficiency and minimize energy consumption. Our novel DRL approach incorporates extended pressure perception, a transformer model processing sequences of observations, and a policy transfer scheme. Notably, significantly improved training stability and speed within our approach allow for end-to-end training of the robotic fish. This enables agiler responses to hydrodynamic environments and possesses greater optimization potential compared to pre-defined motion pattern controls. Our experiments are conducted on a serially connected rigid robotic fish in a free stream with a Reynolds number of 6000 using computational fluid dynamics simulations. The DRL-trained policies yield impressive results, demonstrating both high efficiency and propulsion. The policies also showcase the agent's embodiment, skillfully utilizing its body structure and engaging with surrounding fluid dynamics, as revealed through flow analysis. This study provides valuable insights into the bio-mimetic underwater robots optimization through DRL training, capitalizing on their structural advantages, and ultimately contributing to more efficient underwater propulsion systems.

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Interfacing the IoT in composite manufacturing: An overview

Gowtham,

Jayasheela,

Sivamani

et al. 2024

Reviews on Advanced Materials Science

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It is a well-known fact that many sophisticated works consume a lot of human resources, leading to the need to find effective alternative. The manufacturing industry demands a lot of human resources, with around half of the global working population participating in this sector. Challenges such as sudden conflicts in the data, disasters, and loss of productivity are encountered by the manufacturing industries and can be overcome by monitoring machine performance data and automatically configuring the machines according to changing needs. This emphasizes the importance of the Internet of Things (IoT) in addressing niche areas of manufacturing. IoT is a buzzword heard everywhere around the globe. Implementing this technology makes most of the work more accessible than other conventional methods. This has created a lot of research interest on this topic. Among many manufacturing sectors, polymer composite material manufacturing is one of the most demanding. This review article purely focuses on polymer composite manufacturing and its allied processes. The consolidation of data is based on the influence of IoT on the extraction of fibers and manufacturing of polymer composite material using novel techniques, quality assessment of manufactured polymer composite material, challenges faced in exploring the use of IoT, and future scope. It can be stated from the survey that various researchers have minimally explored the incorporation of IoT, but its future looks very promising in terms of producing high-quality products at less time and lower cost by integrating this technique with conventional methods.

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Multimodal steerable earthworm-inspired soft robot based on vacuum and positive pressure powered pneumatic actuators

Cited by 3 publications

References 33 publications

Nodes for modes: Nodal honeycomb metamaterial enables a soft robot with multimodal locomotion

Nodes for modes: Nodal honeycomb metamaterial enables a soft robot with multimodal locomotion

Enhancing efficiency and propulsion in bio-mimetic robotic fish through end-to-end deep reinforcement learning

Interfacing the IoT in composite manufacturing: An overview

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