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Precise and high-fidelity force control is critical for new generations of robots that interact with humans and unknown environments. Mobile robots, such as wearable devices and legged robots, must also be lightweight to accomplish their…
Robotic arms are key components in fruit-harvesting robots. In agricultural settings, conventional serial or parallel robotic arms often fall short in meeting the demands for a large workspace, rapid movement, enhanced capability of…
The 'infinite' passive degrees of freedom of soft robotic arms render their control especially challenging. In this paper, we leverage a previously developed model, which drawing equivalence of the soft arm to a series of universal joints,…
This paper presents a soft propelled arm, 3D-printed in TPU 70A, designed to be used in flexible UAVs, an advantageous concept since it reduces risk in the event of a collision thanks to a high energy absorption. The proposed design also…
Object manipulation in robotics faces challenges due to diverse object shapes, sizes, and fragility. Gripper-based methods offer precision and low degrees of freedom (DOF) but the gripper limits the kind of objects to grasp. On the other…
We propose a novel multi-section cable-driven soft robotic arm inspired by octopus tentacles along with a new modeling approach. Each section of the modular manipulator is made of a soft tubing backbone, a soft silicon arm body, and two…
This paper introduces a novel design method that enhances the force/torque, bendability, and controllability of soft pneumatic actuators (SPAs). The complex structure of the soft actuator is simplified by approximating it as a cantilever…
Robot-assisted feeding systems enhance the independence of individuals with motor impairments and alleviate caregiver burden. While existing systems predominantly rely on software-based safety features to mitigate risks during unforeseen…
Wire-harnessing tasks pose great challenges to be automated by the robot due to the complex dynamics and unpredictable behavior of the deformable wire. Traditional methods, often reliant on dual-robot arms or tactile sensing, face…
Movement disorders impact muscle strength and mobility, and despite therapeutic efforts, many people with movement disorders have challenges functioning independently. Soft wearable robots, or exosuits, offer a promising solution for…
Advanced machine learning algorithms require platforms that are extremely robust and equipped with rich sensory feedback to handle extensive trial-and-error learning without relying on strong inductive biases. Traditional robotic designs,…
The demining of landmines using drones is challenging; air-releasable payloads are typically non-intelligent (e.g., water balloons or explosives) and deploying them at even low altitudes (~6 meter) is inherently inaccurate due to complex…
Soft robotics has emerged as a promising technology that holds great potential for various application areas. This is due to soft materials unique properties, including flexibility, safety, and shock absorption, among others. Despite many…
Soft robotics is an emerging field that yields promising results for tasks that require safe and robust interactions with the environment or with humans, such as grasping, manipulation, and human-robot interaction. Soft robots rely on…
Hybrid rigid-soft robots combine the precision of rigid manipulators with the compliance and adaptability of soft arms, offering a promising approach for versatile grasping in unstructured environments. However, coordinating hybrid robots…
We design, build, and thoroughly test a new type of actuator dubbed viscoelastic liquid cooled actuator (VLCA) for robotic applications. VLCAs excel in the following five critical axes of performance: energy efficiency, torque density,…
The human hand has an inherent ability to manipulate and re-orientate objects without external assistance. As a consequence, we are able to operate tools and perform an array of actions using just one hand, without having to continuously…
Autonomous robots are projected to significantly augment the manual workforce, especially in repetitive and hazardous tasks. For a successful deployment of such robots in human environments, it is crucial to guarantee human safety.…
The increasing use of drones in human-centric applications highlights the need for designs that can survive collisions and recover rapidly, minimizing risks to both humans and the environment. We present HoLoArm, a quadrotor with compliant…
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…