Related papers: Soft robotic shell with active thermal display

Dynamic control of a soft-body robot to deliver complex behaviors with low-dimensional actuation inputs is challenging. In this paper, we present a computational approach to automatically generate versatile, underactuated control policies…

Robotics presents a promising opportunity for enhancing bathing assistance, potentially to alleviate labor shortages and reduce care costs, while offering consistent and gentle care for individuals with physical disabilities. However,…

Artificial electronic skins covering complete robot bodies can make physical human-robot collaboration safe and hence possible. Standards for collaborative robots (e.g., ISO/TS 15066) prescribe permissible forces and pressures during…

Autonomous systems face the intricate challenge of navigating unpredictable environments and interacting with external objects. The successful integration of robotic agents into real-world situations hinges on their perception capabilities,…

Robotics research has long sought to give robots the ability to perceive the physical world through touch in an analogous manner to many biological systems. Developing such tactile capabilities is important for numerous emerging…

Haptic feedback is important to make robots more dexterous and effective in unstructured environments. High-resolution haptic sensors are still not widely available, and their application is often bound by the resolution-robustness dilemma.…

Touch sensing can help robots understand their sur- rounding environment, and in particular the objects they interact with. To this end, roboticists have, in the last few decades, developed several tactile sensing solutions, extensively…

The human skin exhibits remarkable capability to perceive contact forces and environmental temperatures, providing intricate information essential for nuanced manipulation. Despite recent advancements in soft tactile sensors, a significant…

Miniature locomotion robots with the ability to navigate confined environments show great promise for a wide range of tasks, including search and rescue operations. Soft miniature locomotion robots, as a burgeoning field, have attracted…

Continuum and soft robots can transform diverse sectors, including healthcare, agriculture, marine, and space, thanks to their potential to adaptively interact with unstructured environments. These robots exhibit complex mechanics that pose…

Soft robotics holds transformative potential for enabling adaptive and adaptable systems in dynamic environments. However, the interplay between morphological and control complexities and their collective impact on task performance remains…

Bio-inspired soft robots have already shown the ability to handle uncertainty and adapt to unstructured environments. However, their availability is partially restricted by time-consuming, costly and highly supervised design-fabrication…

Adaptive morphogenetic robots adapt their morphology and control policies to meet changing tasks and environmental conditions. Many such systems leverage soft components, which enable shape morphing but also introduce simulation and control…

This work represents an initial benchmark of a large-scale soft robot performing physical, collaborative manipulation of a long, extended object with a human partner. The robot consists of a pneumatically-actuated, three-link continuum soft…

Soft modular robots enable more flexibility and safer interaction with the changing environment than traditional robots. However, it has remained challenging to create deformable connectors that can be integrated into soft machines. In this…

While much work has been done recently in the realm of model-based control of soft robots and soft-rigid hybrids, most works examine robots that have an inherently serial structure. While these systems have been prevalent in the literature,…

Many of today's robot perception systems aim at accomplishing perception tasks that are too simplistic and too hard. They are too simplistic because they do not require the perception systems to provide all the information needed to…

In this paper, we study integrated estimation and control of soft robots. A significant challenge in deploying closed loop controllers is reliable proprioception via integrated sensing in soft robots. Despite the considerable advances…

The skin of humanoid robots often lacks human tactility and the inherent self-repair capability of biological tissues. Recently, researchers have grown a living, self-healing skin on a robot finger by subsequent culturing of human dermal…

Scrubbing surfaces is a physically demanding and time-intensive task. Removing adhered contamination requires substantial friction generated through pressure and torque or high lateral forces. Rigid robotic manipulators, while capable of…