Related papers: Geometry-based pneumatic actuators for soft roboti…
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…
Modern robots embody power and precision control. Yet, as robots undertake tasks that apply forces on humans, this power brings risk of injury. Soft robotic actuators use deformation to produce smooth, continuous motions and conform to…
Aging populations and the rising prevalence of neurological and musculoskeletal disorders increase the demand for wearable mobility assistive devices that are effective, comfortable, and anatomically compatible. Many existing systems use…
Soft pneumatic actuators are used to steer soft growing "vine" robots while being flexible enough to undergo the tip eversion required for growth. In this study, we compared the performance of three types of pneumatic actuators in terms of…
Soft pneumatic gripping strategies are often based on pressurized actuation of structures made of soft elastomeric materials, which limits designs in terms of size, weight, achievable forces, and ease of fabrication. On the other hand,…
Snapping instabilities in soft structures offer a powerful pathway to achieve rapid and energy-efficient actuation. In this study, an eccentric dome-shaped snapping actuator is developed to generate controllable asymmetric motion through…
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…
Pneumatic soft robots are typically fabricated by molding, a manual fabrication process that requires skilled labor. Additive manufacturing has the potential to break this limitation and speed up the fabrication process but struggles with…
Soft pneumatic actuators with integrated strain limiting layers have emerged as predominant components in the field of soft gripper technology for several decades. However, owing to their intrinsic strain-limiting layer design, these soft…
This paper presents a systematic topology optimization framework for designing a soft pneumatic gripper (SPG), explicitly considering the design-dependent nature of the actuating load. The load is modeled using Darcy's law with an added…
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…
Haptic interfaces that can simultaneously modulate multiple physical properties remain a fundamental challenge in human-robot interaction. Existing systems typically allow the rendering of either geometric features or mechanical properties,…
Soft Robots distinguish themselves from traditional robots by embracing flexible kinematics. Because of their recent emergence, there exist numerous uncharted territories, including novel actuators, manufacturing processes, and advanced…
Soft robotics hold promise in the development of safe yet powered assistive wearable devices for infants. Key to this is the development of closed-loop controllers that can help regulate pneumatic pressure in the device's actuators in an…
Textile pneumatic actuators can provide useful wearable haptic feedback when embedded in gloves, armbands, and other smart garments. Here we investigate actuators fabricated from thermoplastic coated textiles. We measure the effects of…
Biological agents possess bodies that are mostly of soft tissues. Researchers have resorted to soft bodies to investigate Artificial Life (ALife)-related questions; similarly, a new era of soft-bodied robots has just begun. Nevertheless,…
Magnetic-responsive composites that consist of soft matrix embedded with hard-magnetic particles have recently been demonstrated as robust soft active materials for fast-transforming actuation. However, the deformation of the functional…
This work presents a new fiberless soft pneumatic actuator that can work multifunctional and bidirectional, and its embedded sensors give it a self-proprioception ability. This actuator works based on the idea of employing helical pressure…
While soft robot manipulators offer compelling advantages over rigid counterparts, including inherent compliance, safe human-robot interaction, and the ability to conform to complex geometries, accurate forward modeling from low-dimensional…
Soft robots are promising for manipulation tasks thanks to their compliance, safety, and high degree of freedom. However, the commonly used bidirectional continuum segment design means soft robotic manipulators only function in a limited…