Related papers: The Folded Pneumatic Artificial Muscle (foldPAM): …
Reconfigurable robots are at the forefront of robotics innovation due to their unmatched versatility and adaptability in addressing various tasks through collaborative operations. This paper explores the design and implementation of a novel…
Aerial manipulators, which combine robotic arms with multi-rotor drones, face strict constraints on arm weight and mechanical complexity. In this work, we study a lightweight 2-degree-of-freedom (DoF) arm mounted on a quadrotor via a…
Soft pneumatic legged robots show promise in their ability to traverse a range of different types of terrain, including natural unstructured terrain met in applications like precision agriculture. They can adapt their body morphology to the…
Soft robotics is a rapidly growing field that spans the fields of chemistry, materials science, and engineering. Due to the diverse background of the field, there have been contrasting naming schemes such as 'intelligent', 'smart' and…
We propose a novel tri-fingered soft robotic gripper with decoupled stiffness and shape control capability for performing adaptive grasping with minimum system complexity. The proposed soft fingers adaptively conform to object shapes…
Image acquisition techniques such as micro-computed tomography are nowadays widely available. Quantitative analysis of the resulting 3D image data enables geometric characterization of the micro-structure of materials. Stochastic geometry…
In this paper a novel aerial manipulation system is proposed. The mechanical structure of the system, the number of thrusters and their geometry will be derived from technical optimization problems. The aforementioned problems are defined…
We present the modeling, design, fabrication and feedback control of an earthworm-inspired soft robot capable of crawling on surfaces by actively manipulating the frictional force between its body and the surface. Earthworms are segmented…
Nematic elastomers are programmable soft materials that display large, reversible and predictable deformation under an external stimulus such as a change in temperature or light. While much of the work in the field has focused on actuation…
Even though artificial muscles have gained popularity due to their compliant, flexible, and compact properties, there currently does not exist an easy way of making informed decisions on the appropriate actuation strategy when designing a…
This paper presents the design and development of a highly articulated, continuum, wearable, fabric-based Soft Poly-Limb (fSPL). This fabric soft arm acts as an additional limb that provides the wearer with mobile manipulation assistance…
Parallel kinematic manipulators (PKM) are characterized by closed kinematic loops, due to the parallel arrangement of limbs but also due to the existence of kinematic loops within the limbs. Moreover, many PKM are built with limbs…
Although research studies in pneumatic soft robots develop rapidly, most pneumatic actuators are still controlled by rigid valves and conventional electronics. The existence of these rigid, electronic components sacrifices the compliance…
This paper presents a comprehensive analysis of the contact force profile of a single-cell bidirectional soft pneumatic actuator, specifically designed to aid in the abduction and adduction of the shoulder for pediatric exosuits. The…
As aerial robots gain traction in industrial applications, there is growing interest in enhancing their physical interaction capabilities. Pushing tasks performed by aerial manipulators have been successfully demonstrated in contact-based…
Soft grippers are receiving growing attention due to their compliance-based interactive safety and dexterity. Hybrid gripper (soft actuators enhanced by rigid constraints) is a new trend in soft gripper design. With right structural…
Aerial robotic arms aim to enable inspection and environment interaction in otherwise hard-to-reach areas from the air. However, many aerial manipulators feature bulky or heavy robot manipulators mounted to large, high-payload aerial…
Wearable distributed tactile devices aim to provide multipoint touch stimuli, but struggle to provide sufficient forces (> 1 N) at frequencies to invoke deep pressure sensation with minimal encumbrance at small scales. This work presents a…
Autonomous deployment and shape reconfiguration of structures is a crucial field of research in space exploration with emerging applications in the automotive, building and biomedical industries. Challenges in achieving autonomy include:…
This work focuses on closed-loop control based on proprioceptive feedback for a pneumatically-actuated soft wearable device aimed at future support of infant reaching tasks. The device comprises two soft pneumatic actuators (one…