Related papers: Growing structure based on viscous actuation of co…

Robots built from soft materials can alter their shape and size in a particular profile. This shape-changing ability could be extremely helpful for rescue robots and those operating in unknown terrains and environments. In changing shape,…

Tip-driven growth processes underlie the development of many plants. To date, tip-driven growth processes have been modelled as an elongating path or series of segments without taking into account lateral expansion during elongation.…

Soft and frangible materials that remodel under flow can give rise to branched patterns shaped by material properties, boundary conditions, and the time scales of forcing. We present a general theoretical framework for emergent branching in…

Soft growing robots, are a type of robots that are designed to move and adapt to their environment in a similar way to how plants grow and move with potential applications where they could be used to navigate through tight spaces, dangerous…

Robots operating in human environments must be able to rearrange objects into semantically-meaningful configurations, even if these objects are previously unseen. In this work, we focus on the problem of building physically-valid structures…

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…

Numerical simulations in two space dimensions are used to examine the dynamics, transport, and equilibrium behaviors of a neutrally buoyant circular object immersed in an active suspension within a larger closed circular container. The…

We address the folding induced by differential growth in soft layered solids via an elementary model that consists of a soft growing neo-Hookean elastic layer adhered to a deep elastic substrate. As the layer/substrate modulus ratio is…

We present PufferBot, an aerial robot with an expandable structure that may expand to protect a drone's propellers when the robot is close to obstacles or collocated humans. PufferBot is made of a custom 3D-printed expandable scissor…

It is well known that jammed soft materials will flow if sheared above their yield stress - think mayonnaise spread on bread - but a complete microscopic description of this seemingly sim- ple process has yet to emerge. What remains elusive…

The design of physical compliance -- its location, degree, and structure -- affects robot performance and robustness in contact-rich tasks. While compliance is often used in the robot's joints, flange, or end-effector, this paper proposes…

Many biological materials must couple mechanical strength with the ability to rapidly self-assemble at a specific location. In particular, biomolecular condensates readily self-assemble via phase separation, but may also need to resist…

The ability to deal with articulated objects is very important for robots assisting humans. In this work, a framework to robustly and adaptively operate common doors, using an autonomous mobile manipulator, is proposed. To push forward the…

The transport of individual entities through interconnected structures is a process of practical relevance both in biology and technology. Examples are given by diffusive dynamics of molecules in porous structures. In soft environments,…

Soft machines typically exhibit slow locomotion speed and low manipulation strength because of intrinsic limitations of soft materials. Here, we present a generic design principle that harnesses mechanical instability for a variety of…

Passive deformation due to compliance is a commonly used benefit of soft robots, providing opportunities to achieve robust actuation with few active degrees of freedom. Soft growing robots in particular have shown promise in navigation of…

The intentional growth of metastable surface structures of organic molecules adsorbed on inorganic substrates is a challenging task. It is usually unclear which kinetic mechanism leads to the metastable surface polymorph after a deposition…

Soft robots - due to their intrinsic flexibility of the body - can adaptively navigate unstructured environments. One of the most popular locomotion gaits that has been implemented in soft robots is undulation. The undulation motion in soft…

In spite of recent progress, soft robotics still suffers from a lack of unified modeling framework. Nowadays, the most adopted model for the design and control of soft robots is the piece-wise constant curvature model, with its consolidated…

This paper presents a comprehensive methodology for modeling an on-orbit assembly mission scenario of a large flexible structure using a multi-arm robot. This methodology accounts for significant changes in inertia and flexibility…