Programmable Design of Soft Actuators and Robots

Liao, Bing; Zang, Hongbin; Yang, Liu; Lang, Xin; Jin, Jin; Zhu, Nana; Yin, Qiang

doi:10.1109/wrc-sara.2019.8931801

Cited by 3 publications

(5 citation statements)

References 26 publications

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“…Elastomers (Ecoflex [6][7][8][9][10][11][12][13][14][15][16], Dragon Skin [17], Sylgard 184 [18,19], other [20][21][22][23][24][25]), fabric [15,26,27], Filaflex [28], hydrogels [29], Diels-Alder polymer [30], polypropylene [31], FC72 fluid [24], ethanol [16], paper [32], urethane [27], gelatin-based biogel [33] Phase Change Material Elastomer Composite (PCMEC) Elastomers [34][35][36], phase change material (wax [35], ethanol [34])…”

Section: Fluidic Chambermentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Alternatives have also been proposed. Yuk et al [29] developed soft hydrogel-based hydraulic actuators [29], while other works used stiffer polypropylene bellows [31]. Baumgartner et al [33] developed a biodegradable material and demonstrated its potential for pneumatic actuators [33].…”

Section: Soft Isotropic Transducersmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…The pneumatic or hydraulic pressure commonly ranges between 0.2 bar and 1 bar, depending mainly on the actuator structural stiffness (material stiffness, geometry and dimensions), and is limited by the risk of bursting or leakage. Several works reported input pressures up to 3 bar [22,31]. The pressure lines in congestion remain an important limitation of fluidic chamber actuators in terms of miniaturization and tetherability.…”

Section: Soft Isotropic Transducersmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Helixing can also be generated by changing the bellow angle [28]. If the transducer expands (Figure 7h 2 ), the bellow geometry will generate an elongation of the actuator [31]. Inversely, contraction will be obtained with negative pressures [31].…”

Section: Geometrymentioning

confidence: 99%

“…If the transducer expands (Figure 7h 2 ), the bellow geometry will generate an elongation of the actuator [31]. Inversely, contraction will be obtained with negative pressures [31]. Other bellow-like structures can be used to vary the stiffness along the actuator height.…”

Section: Geometrymentioning

confidence: 99%

See 4 more Smart Citations

Programmable Stimuli-Responsive Actuators for Complex Motions in Soft Robotics: Concept, Design and Challenges

et al. 2020

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During the last years, great progress was made in material science in terms of concept, design and fabrication of new composite materials with conferred properties and desired functionalities. The scientific community paid particular interest to active soft materials, such as soft actuators, for their potential as transducers responding to various stimuli aiming to produce mechanical work. Inspired by this, materials engineers today are developing multidisciplinary approaches to produce new active matters, focusing on the kinematics allowed by the material itself more than on the possibilities offered by its design. Traditionally, more complex motions beyond pure elongation and bending are addressed by the robotics community. The present review targets encompassing and rationalizing a framework which will help a wider scientific audience to understand, sort and design future soft actuators and methods enabling complex motions. Special attention is devoted to recent progress in developing innovative stimulus-responsive materials and approaches for complex motion programming for soft robotics. In this context, a challenging overview of the new materials as well as their classification and comparison (performances and characteristics) are proposed. In addition, the great potential of soft transducers are outlined in terms of kinematic capabilities, illustrated by the related application. Guidelines are provided to design actuators and to integrate asymmetry enabling motions along any of the six basic degrees of freedom (translations and rotations), and strategies towards the programming of more complex motions are discussed. As a final note, a series of manufacturing methods are described and compared, from molding to 3D and 4D printing. The review ends with a Perspectives section, from material science and microrobotic points of view, on the soft materials’ future and close future challenges to be overcome.

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Section: Fluidic Chambermentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Soft Isotropic Transducersmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Soft Isotropic Transducersmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Geometrymentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Geometrymentioning

confidence: 99%

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Programmable Stimuli-Responsive Actuators for Complex Motions in Soft Robotics: Concept, Design and Challenges

et al. 2020

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Additive manufacturing of structural materials

Liu

Zhang

Chen

et al. 2021

Materials Science and Engineering: R: Reports

390

112

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Tendon-Driven Gripper with Variable Stiffness Joint and Water-Cooled SMA Springs

Thien

Luong

et al. 2023

Actuators

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In recent years, there has been an increase in the development of medical robots to enhance interventional MRI-guided therapies and operations. Magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) surgical robots are particularly attractive due to their ability to provide excellent soft-tissue contrast during these procedures. This paper describes a novel design for a tendon-driven gripper that utilizes four shape memory alloy (SMA) spring actuators and variable stiffness joints controlled by SMA coils for use in MRI surgical robot applications. The contact force of the gripper link is determined by the mechanical properties of the SMA spring actuators (SSA) and the angle of each linkage, and the joint stiffness can be adjusted by varying the electrical current applied to the SMA coil. To enhance the efficiency of the SSAs, a new cooling system using water has been proposed and implemented. To validate the effectiveness of our proposed gripper, we conducted three types of experiments, namely, a single SSA experiment, a single SMA coil experiment, and a whole gripper experiment. The experimental results demonstrate that the proposed water-cooling system can effectively solve temperature issues of SMA, and the joint stiffness in the austenite state is higher than that in the martensite state. Moreover, our experiments show that the presented gripper is capable of grasping and holding objects of various shapes and weights.

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Programmable Design of Soft Actuators and Robots

Cited by 3 publications

References 26 publications

Programmable Stimuli-Responsive Actuators for Complex Motions in Soft Robotics: Concept, Design and Challenges

Programmable Stimuli-Responsive Actuators for Complex Motions in Soft Robotics: Concept, Design and Challenges

Additive manufacturing of structural materials

Tendon-Driven Gripper with Variable Stiffness Joint and Water-Cooled SMA Springs

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