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Smart surfaces that reversibly change the interfacial friction coefficients in response to external stimuli enable a wide range of applications, such as grips, seals, brake pads, packaging films, and fabrics. Here a new concept of such a…
Soft robots could bring robotic systems to new horizons, by enabling safe human-machine interaction. For precise control, these soft structures require high level position feedback that is not easily achieved through conventional…
Classical rigid-bodied robotic systems are presented with proven success in theoretical development and industrial applications, are recently challenged by the emergence of soft robotics due to a growing need in physical human-robot…
Liquid crystal elastomers realize a fascinating new form of soft matter that is a composite of a conventional crosslinked polymer gel (rubber) and a liquid crystal. These {\em solid} liquid crystal amalgams, quite similarly to their…
Slender magnetic elements provide a versatile platform for programmable shape-morphing under remote magnetic actuation. However, a general and physically interpretable framework for the inverse design of a `magneto-elastica' under…
Soft robots have the potential to revolutionize the use of robotic systems with their capability of establishing safe, robust, and adaptable interactions with their environment, but their precise control remains challenging. In contrast,…
Mechanical metamaterials are artificial composites with tunable advanced mechanical properties. Particularly interesting types of mechanical metamaterials are flexible metamaterials, which harness internal rotations and instabilities to…
Soft robots have been increasingly utilized as sophisticated tools in physical rehabilitation, particularly for assisting patients with neuromotor impairments. However, many soft robotics for rehabilitation applications are characterized by…
Electromechanical actuators exploit the Lorentz force law to convert electrical energy into rotational or linear mechanical energy. In these electromagnetically induced motions, the electrical current flows through wires that are rigid and…
In this paper we describe a stretchable solid-state electronic switching material that operates at high voltage potentials, as well as a switch material benchmarking technique that utilizes a modular dielectric elastomer (artificial muscle)…
In most macro-scale robotics systems , propulsion and controls are enabled through a physical tether or complex on-board electronics and batteries. A tether simplifies the design process but limits the range of motion of the robot, while…
Nematic elastomers and glasses are solids that display spontaneous distortion under external stimuli. Recent advances in the synthesis of sheets with controlled heterogeneities have enabled their actuation into non-trivial shapes with…
We introduce an elastic-driven self-folding approach that fabricates robots directly from flat 3D-printed conductive PLA nets. Elastic bands routed through printed hooks store energy that folds the sheet into programmed 3D geometries, while…
Soft robotic manipulators are attractive for a range of applications such as medical interventions or industrial inspections in confined environments. A myriad of soft robotic manipulators have been proposed in the literature, but their…
Soft robots are notoriously hard to control. This is partly due to the scarcity of models able to capture their complex continuum mechanics, resulting in a lack of control methodologies that take full advantage of body compliance. Currently…
Soft robots enable safe, adaptive interaction with complex environments but remain difficult to sense and control due to their highly deformable structures. Architected soft materials such as helicoid lattices offer tunable stiffness and…
A new methodology for micromagnetic simulations of magnetic nanocomposites is presented. The methodology is especially suitable for simulations of two-phase composites consisting of magnetically hard inclusions in a soft magnetic matrix…
Research on the co-optimization of soft robotic design and control requires rapid means for real-world validation. Existing creation pipelines do not allow for the swift prototyping of soft robots to quickly test various design…
Robotic systems operating in unstructured environments require the ability to switch between compliant and rigid states to perform diverse tasks such as adaptive grasping, high-force manipulation, shape holding, and navigation in…
We present a flexible set-up for determining the rheology of visco-elastic materials which is based on the mechanical response of a magnet deposited at the surface of a slab of material and excited electromagnetically. An interferometric…