Abstract
Recently, interest to develop soft robots that mimic flora and fauna in the natural environment has been growing in order to meet the demand for shortage in labor, working in hazardous environments, disaster management, health care and oceanography. Actuators that are made from soft materials, such as elastomers and hydrogels, are integral components of soft robots. Although, 3D printing is a versatile technique to fabricate prototypes, it is a well-known fact that 3D printing for soft materials is challenging. In this work, we present the fabrication and characterization of 3D-printed hydrogel soft actuator that mimics a jellyfish. The developed actuators consist of three parts; (1) Connector: which is the joint part between the main body of actuator and the inlet tube for air pressure, (2) Box: which is balloon-like inflation part and; (3) Base: which is connected to the Box. The results indicate that the normalized contraction ratio of the 3D-printed actuator is close value to that of moon jellyfish and is applicable to a jellyfish-mimic robot. Furthermore, it is observed that, the relationship between applied air pressure and injected volume is linear without balloon defects.
Funder
Cabinet Office, Government of Japan
Japan Society for the Promotion of Science
Center of Innovation Program
Program on Open Innovation Platform with Enterprises, Research Institute and Academia
Publisher
The Electrochemical Society
Subject
Electronic, Optical and Magnetic Materials
Cited by
29 articles.
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