Publications related to Shape programmable multi-stable polymer actuators

Educational Soft Underwater Robot with an Electromagnetic Actuation

As demonstrated by the Soft Robotics Toolkit Platform, compliant robotics pose an exciting educational opportunity. Underwater robotics using soft undulating fins is an expansive research topic with applications such as exploration of underwater life or re ...

Mary Ann Liebert, Inc2024

Permanently magnetized elastomer rotating actuator using traveling waves

Herbert Shea

We report a soft actuator that generates continuous rotation of an object placed on it by electromagnetically exciting circular travelling waves in a soft disk. The disk, that serves as the stator, is made of a stretchable composite consisting of segments ...

Iop Publishing Ltd2024

Additively manufactured stretchable zipping electrostatic actuators

Giulio Grasso

The use of soft and stretchable materials allows the development of adaptive robotic systems and human-machine interfaces that are more natural and comfortable to interact with. One of the application fields that benefits the most from these compliant mate ...

EPFL2024

Carbon based printed electrodes for DEAs: study of pad, inkjet, and stencil printing

Yves Perriard, Yoan René Cyrille Civet, Thomas Guillaume Martinez, Stefania Maria Aliki Konstantinidi, Armando Matthieu Walter, Simon Holzer

Dielectric elastomer actuators (DEAs) have raised interest due to their remarkable capabilities in various applications, such as soft robotics, haptic feedback systems, and biomedical devices. To harness the full potential of DEAs, the choice of the electr ...

Society of Photo-Optical Instrumentation Engineers (SPIE)2024

Edible Soft Actuators based on Konjac Glucomannan for Underwater Operation

Dario Floreano, Jun Shintake, Ryo Kanno, Bokeon Kwak, Markéta Pankhurst

Soft robots are being increasingly developed and deployed for underwater applications such as exploration, monitoring, and rescue owing to their innate compliance, mechanical and chemical stability, and waterproof properties. However, they are still predom ...

2024

Frequency response of fiber reinforced DEAs

Yves Perriard, Yoan René Cyrille Civet, Thomas Guillaume Martinez, Stefania Maria Aliki Konstantinidi, Markus Koenigsdorff

Dielectric Elastomer Actuators (DEAs) have emerged as versatile and promising devices for a multitude of applications, including soft robotics, haptic interfaces, and artificial muscles. DEAs are an interesting soft actuator technology due to their high en ...

Society of Photo-Optical Instrumentation Engineers (SPIE)2024

Inversing the actuation cycle of dielectric elastomer actuators for a facial prosthesis

Paolo Germano, Yves Perriard, Yoan René Cyrille Civet, Alexis Boegli, Thomas Guillaume Martinez, Stefania Maria Aliki Konstantinidi, Quentin Philippe Mario De Menech

Dielectric Elastomer Actuators (DEAs) are a type of smart material described as compliant capacitors. They show impressive performances as soft actuators, such as a high strain and fast response. Nonetheless, replicating natural muscle function with DEAs h ...

Society of Photo-Optical Instrumentation Engineers (SPIE)2024

Parametric Reduced Order Model of a Gas Bearings Supported Rotor

Jürg Alexander Schiffmann, Fabio Nobile, Dimitri Maurice Goutaudier

Gas bearings use pressurized gas as a lubricant to support and guide rotating machinery. These bearings have a number of advantages over traditional lubricated bearings, including higher efficiency in a variety of applications and reduced maintenance requi ...

2023

Moulding and Microfluidic Wet Spinning of the Soft Polymer Optical Fibers for Sensory Applications

Khushdeep Sharma

Polymer optical fibre (POFs) based wearable sensors have attracted a lot of attention in the field of healthcare and biomedical applications. They are in particular envision as the next generation of sensors for the continuous, real-time n ...

EPFL2024

Soft Robotics: A Route to Equality, Diversity, and Inclusivity in Robotics

Josephine Anna Eleanor Hughes

Robotics is entering our daily lives. The discipline is increasingly crucial in fields such as agriculture, medicine, and rescue operations, impacting our food, health, and planet. At the same time, it is becoming evident that robotic research must embrace ...

Mary Ann Liebert, Inc2024

3D printed large amplitude torsional microactuators powered by ultrasound

Mehdi Ali Gadiri, Mahmut Selman Sakar, Amit Yedidia Dolev, Junsun Hwang

Here, we introduce a design, fabrication, and control methodology for large amplitude torsional microactuators powered by ultrasound. The microactuators are 3D printed from two polymers with drastically different elastic moduli as a monolithic compliant me ...

2024

Improved microfluidic transcriptome based screening methods

Christoph Merten, Leonie Kolmar, Xiaoli Ma, Hongxing Hu

The invention provides microfluidic screening systems for the identification of compounds or compositions influencing cellular transcriptomes. The invention is predicated upon taking into account differences in newly synthesized mRNA in contrast to so call ...

2024

Soft Bending Actuator With Fiber-Jamming Variable Stiffness and Fiber-Optic Proprioception

Sudong Lee

Soft actuators with a function of variable stiffness are beneficial to the improvement of the adaptability of robots, expanding the application areas and environments. We propose a tendon-driven soft bending actuator that can change its stiffness using fib ...

Ieee-Inst Electrical Electronics Engineers Inc2023

Modeling and analysis of miniaturized magnetorheological valve for fluidic actuation

Sofia Lydia Ntella

Fluidic actuation enables movement in a wide range of mechanical systems, from simple laboratory devices to more complex industrial machinery. Fluids are used to generate motion of mechanical pieces. The term "fluids" encompasses two types of technologies: ...

EPFL2023

Fabrication and Characterization of the Kirigami-Inspired SMA-Powered Actuator

Yves Perriard, Sean Thomas, Guilain Lionel Germain Lang, Thomas Guillaume Martinez, Marjan Ghorbani

This paper presents an innovative approach to creating Shape Memory Alloys (SMA)-based actuators that are lightweight, compact, and capable of providing large strokes. Inspired by the Kirigami structure, an SMA actuator is designed using the Ω -pattern, wh ...

2023

Accessible Soft Robotics Education with Re-configurable Balloon Robots

Yi-Shiun Wu, Josephine Anna Eleanor Hughes, Kieran Daniel Gilday

Soft robotics requires effective tools to educate the next generation of engineers and researchers. Stemming from a lack of universally accepted principles for education and with high barriers to entry in terms of fabrication and hardware, education to dat ...

IEEE2023

Soft Multimaterial Magnetic Fibers and Textiles

Fabien Sorin, Syrine Mansour, Stella Andréa Françoise Laperrousaz, Chaoqun Dong, Andreas Leber, Hritwick Banerjee, Xue Wan, Rémi Andréa La Polla

Magnetically responsive soft materials are promising building blocks for the next generation of soft robotics, prosthesis, surgical tools, and smart textiles. To date, however, the fabrication of highly integrated magnetic fibers with extreme aspect ratios ...

Wiley-V C H Verlag Gmbh2023

Dynamic control of high-voltage actuator arrays by light-pattern projection on photoconductive switches

Herbert Shea, Amir Firouzeh, Vesna Bacheva, Edouard Franck Vincent Gustave Leroy, Aiste Balciunaite

The ability to control high-voltage actuator arrays relies, to date, on expensive microelectronic processes or on individual wiring of each actuator to a single off-chip high-voltage switch. Here we present an alternative approach that uses on-chip photoco ...

SPRINGERNATURE2023

Sensorless force and displacement estimation in soft actuators

Jamie Paik, Sagar Dattatray Joshi

Sensing forms an integral part of soft matter based robots due to their compliance, dependence on loading conditions, and virtually infinite degrees of freedom. Previous studies have developed several extrinsic sensors and embedded them into soft actuators ...

ROYAL SOC CHEMISTRY2023

Electrode Impact on the Electrical Breakdown of Dielectric Elastomer Thin Films

Herbert Shea, Fabio Beco Albuquerque

Dielectric Elastomer Actuators (DEAs) enable the realization of energy-efficient and compact actuator systems. DEAs operate at the kilovolt range with typically microampere-level currents and hence minimize thermal losses in comparison to low voltage/high ...

MDPI2023