Related papers: Expanding the Design Space for Electrically-Driven…
Soft robots promise inherent safety via their material compliance for seamless interactions with humans or delicate environments. Yet, their development is challenging because it requires integrating materials, geometry, actuation, and…
Soft pneumatic actuators enable safe human-machine interaction with lightweight and powerful applied parts. On the other side, they suffer design limitations as regards complex actuation patterns, including minimum bending radii,…
Soft optical tactile sensors enable robots to manipulate deformable objects by capturing important features such as high-resolution contact geometry and estimations of object compliance. This work presents a variable stiffness soft tactile…
Legged robots constructed from soft materials are commonly claimed to demonstrate safer, more robust environmental interactions than their rigid counterparts. However, this motivating feature of soft robots requires more rigorous…
Soft robots offer unmatched adaptability and safety in unstructured environments, yet their compliant, high-dimensional, and nonlinear dynamics make modeling for control notoriously difficult. Existing data-driven approaches often fail to…
Simulating deformable objects under rich interactions remains a fundamental challenge for real-to-sim robot manipulation, with dynamics jointly driven by environmental effects and robot actions. Existing simulators rely on predefined…
Wearable robots are limited by their actuators performances because they must bear the weight of their own power system and energy source. This paper explores the idea of leveraging hybrid modes to meet multiple operating points with a…
In the field of soft robotics, flexibility, adaptability, and functionality define a new era of robotic systems that can safely deform, reach, and grasp. To optimize the design of soft robotic systems, it is critical to understand their…
To enlarge the translational workspace of cable-driven robots, one common approach is to increase the number of cables. However, this introduces two challenges: (1) cable interference significantly reduces the rotational workspace, and (2)…
Intrinsically elastic robots surpass their rigid counterparts in a range of different characteristics. By temporarily storing potential energy and subsequently converting it to kinetic energy, elastic robots are capable of highly dynamic…
Configurational, or Eshelby-like, forces are shown to strongly influence the nonlinear dynamics of an elastic rod constrained with a frictionless sliding sleeve at one end and with an attached mass at the other end. The configurational…
Legged robots are typically in rigid contact with the environment at multiple locations, which add a degree of complexity to their control. We present a method to control the motion and a subset of the contact forces of a floating-base…
Portable pneumatic systems for 2 degree-of-freedom (DOF) soft shoulder exosuits remain underexplored, and face fundamental trade-offs between torque output and dynamic response that are further compounded by the need for multiple actuators…
Continuum soft robots are mechanical systems entirely made of continuously deformable elements. This design solution aims to bring robots closer to invertebrate animals and soft appendices of vertebrate animals (e.g., an elephant's trunk, a…
Robots built from soft materials will inherently apply lower environmental forces than their rigid counterparts, and therefore may be more suitable in sensitive settings with unintended contact. However, these robots' applied forces result…
Robotic arms built from stiffness-adjustable, continuously bending segments serially connected with revolute joints have the ability to change their mechanical architecture and workspace, thus allowing high flexibility and adaptation to…
The programming of robotic assembly tasks is a key component in manufacturing and automation. Force-sensitive assembly, however, often requires reactive strategies to handle slight changes in positioning and unforeseen part jamming.…
Conformable robotic systems are attractive for applications in which they can be used to actuate structures with large surface areas, to provide forces through wearable garments, or to realize autonomous robotic systems. We present a new…
Underwater robotics has advanced significantly over recent decades. however, the development of miniaturized underwater robots remains limited by low energy densities of traditional power sources. Nature offers compelling…
Soft, tip-extending "vine" robots offer a unique mode of inspection and manipulation in highly constrained environments. For practicality, it is desirable that the distal end of the robot can be manipulated freely, while the body remains…