Directional Stiffness-Switching Soft Robots via Phase-Changing Metallic Spines
AUTHORS
ABSTRACT
Conventional soft robots are designed with constant, passive stiffness properties, based on desired motion
capabilities. The ability to encode two fundamentally different
stiffness characteristics promises to enable a single robot to
be optimized for multiple divergent tasks simultaneously and
this has been previously proposed with a variety of approaches
including jamming-based designs. In this paper, we propose
phase-changing metallic spines of various geometries to independently control specific directional stiffness parameters of soft
robots, changing how they respond to their actuation inputs and
external loads. We fabricate spine-like structures using a low
melting point alloy (LMPA), enabling us to switch on and off the
effects of the stiff metal structure of the overall robot’s stiffness
during use. Changing soft robot morphology in this manner
will enable these robots to adapt to environments and tasks
that require divergent motion and force/moment application
capabilities.
Tags: Conference Papers 2024