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Compared to traditional rigid robotics, soft robotics has attracted increasing attention due to its advantages as compliance, safety, and low cost. As an essential part of soft robotics, the soft robotic gripper also shows its superior…
Inflated-beam soft robots, such as tip-everting vine robots, can control curvature by contracting one beam side via pneumatic actuation. This work develops a general finite element modeling approach to characterize their bending. The model…
Due to their ability to move without sliding relative to their environment, soft growing robots are attractive for deploying distributed sensor networks in confined spaces. Sensing of the state of such robots would also add to their…
3D-printed digital materials whose mechanical behavior travels between those from thermoplastic to rubbery polymers have become increasingly important. However, their mechanical functionalities have not been fully exploited due to intrinsic…
Electrostatic actuators provide a promising approach to creating soft robotic sheets, due to their flexible form factor, modular integration, and fast response speed. However, their control requires kilo-Volt signals and understanding of…
Strain engineering allows the physical properties of materials and devices to be widely tailored, as paradigmatically demonstrated by strained transistors and semiconductor lasers employed in consumer electronics. For this reason, its…
This paper presents the initial development of a robotic additive manufacturing technology based on ultraviolet (UV)-curable thermoset polymers. This is designed to allow free-standing printing through partial UV curing and fiber…
We describe a fluidic actuator design that replaces the sealed chamber of a hydraulic cylinder using a soft actuator to provide compliant linear compression with a large force ($\geq$100 N) at a low operation pressure ($\leq$50 kPa) for a…
Variable stiffness actuator (VSA) designs are manifold. Conventional model-based control of these nonlinear systems is associated with high effort and design-dependent assumptions. In contrast, machine learning offers a promising…
Hysterons are elementary units of hysteresis that underlie many complex behaviors of non-equilibrium matter. Because models of interacting hysterons can describe disordered matter, this suggests that artificial systems could respond to…
Three-dimensional (3D) printing of bioelectronics offers a versatile platform for fabricating personalized and structurally integrated electronic systems within biological scaffolds. Biodegradable electronics, which naturally dissolve after…
Mobile 3D printing on unstructured terrain remains challenging due to the conflict between platform mobility and deposition precision. Existing gantry-based systems achieve high accuracy but lack mobility, while mobile platforms struggle to…
3D-printed artificial skins are a scalable approach to whole-body tactile and proximity coverage, but prior implementations have been limited to unimodal sensing and rigid materials. To improve the practical usability of 3D-printed…
Shape displays are a class of haptic devices that enable whole-hand haptic exploration of 3D surfaces. However, their scalability is limited by the mechanical complexity and high cost of traditional actuator arrays. In this paper, we…
Robotic manipulation has made significant advancements, with systems demonstrating high precision and repeatability. However, this remarkable precision often fails to translate into efficient manipulation of thin deformable objects. Current…
With the increasing demand for personalized health monitoring, wearable sensors have gained attention in medical diagnostics and physiological tracking. Hydrogels, known for their mechanical properties and similarity to biological tissues,…
In this project, we focus on human-robot interaction in caregiving scenarios like bathing, where physical contact is inevitable and necessary for proper task execution because force must be applied to the skin. Using finite element…
The rapid design and fabrication of soft robotic matter is of growing interest for shape morphing, actuation, and wearable devices. Here, we report a facile fabrication method for creating soft robotic materials with embedded pneumatics…
We present an investigation of inkjet printed strain gauges based on two-dimensional (2D) materials. The technology leverages water-based and biocompatible inks to fabricate strain measurement devices on flexible substrates such as paper.…
Soft robotics is a field of robotic system design characterized by materials and structures that exhibit large-scale deformation, high compliance, and rich multifunctionality. The incorporation of soft and deformable structures endows soft…