STTR Phase I: An Actuated Skin for Robotic Facial Expressions

STTR 第一阶段：用于机器人面部表情的驱动皮肤

• 批准号: 0539852
• 负责人: David Hanson
• 金额: $ 10万
• 依托单位: Hanson Robotics, Inc.
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 项目类别: Standard Grant
• 财政年份: 2006
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 2006-01-01 至 2006-12-31
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward?AWD_ID=0539852&HistoricalAwards=false
• 关键词: STTR; Phase; Actuated; Skin; Robotic

This Small Business Technology Transfer (STTR) Phase I research program proposes a novel concept for actuating artificial human-like skin. The application of the artificial skin in numerous applications such as robotic faces, prosthetics and medical simulation devices, animatronics, and high-end toys has been limited because of the lack of adequate muscle-like technologies. A solution to this problem is a novel composite actuator, a hybrid of micro piezoelectric actuators and a porous elastomer which will exhibit several characteristics of natural muscle tissues. The key to these advances is a new technique called structured porosity elastomer manufacturing (SPEM). The objectives are to determine the effect of pore geometry on the material properties in porous elastomers, use this understanding for optimization of the porous network, to fabricate the optimized pore-structure in elastomers by developing a hybrid of rapid-prototyping and injection molding processes, to identify the synthesis issues required for embedding of the piezoelectric actuators in the porous elastomer, and to fabricate the robotic face integrated with novel motion control electronics for driving micro piezoelectric actuators and ultrasonic motors.This research will lead to the fundamental understanding of piezo-actuated structured porous elastomer composite actuators as artificial muscles, their manufacturing technologies, and supporting technologies including drivers, wiring and anchoring. This understanding will be helpful in producing a wide array of bio-inspired mechanical devices that are actuated in the manner of muscles. The development of hybrid of rapid-prototyping of 3D sacrificial material and micro-arrays of piezoactuators, by means of micro-robotic gripper arrayswill provide a practical solution for mass production of active, synthetic soft tissues.

这项小型企业技术转移（STTR）第一阶段研究计划提出了一种驱动人造类人皮肤的新概念。由于缺乏足够的类肌肉技术，人造皮肤在机器人面部、假肢和医疗模拟设备、电子动画和高端玩具等众多应用中的应用受到了限制。解决这一问题的方法是一种新型的复合驱动器，一种微压电驱动器和多孔弹性体的混合驱动器，它将表现出天然肌肉组织的几个特征。这些进步的关键是一种称为结构孔隙弹性体制造（SPEM）的新技术。目标是确定孔隙几何形状对多孔弹性体材料性能的影响，利用这种理解来优化多孔网络，通过开发快速成型和注射成型工艺的混合工艺来制造优化的弹性体孔隙结构，确定在多孔弹性体中嵌入压电致动器所需的合成问题。并将新型运动控制电子器件集成到机器人面部，用于驱动微型压电驱动器和超声波电机。这项研究将导致对作为人造肌肉的压电驱动结构多孔弹性体复合执行器的基本理解，以及它们的制造技术，以及包括驱动、布线和锚定在内的支持技术。这种理解将有助于生产一系列以肌肉方式驱动的仿生机械装置。三维牺牲材料的快速成型和压电致动器微阵列的混合发展，将为大规模生产活性合成软组织提供实用的解决方案。