SBIR Phase I: An Innovative Robotic Jamming Gripper

这个小企业创新研究（SBIR）第一阶段项目将开发一种创新的机器人夹持器，利用颗粒材料独特的干扰行为，使设备能够被动地适应不同形状的物体，然后真空硬化以刚性地抓住它们。这些干扰夹持器是一个独特的解决方案，需要灵活的夹持和操纵任意形状的物体与一个单一的夹持器。这种需求出现在制造机器人、假肢，以及越来越多的家用和医疗机器人领域。发表在顶级科学期刊上的初步结果表明，该技术已在实验室环境中成功实施。该项目的研究目标是将这种创新带出实验室，并证明商业可行性。目标是：1)迭代测试和优化外膜材料的性能和耐久性，以满足工业阈值；2)颗粒材料的测试和优化，以提高抓手性能和可制造性；3)测试不同尺寸的夹持器，量化缩放对性能的影响；4)展示行业顾问和潜在客户要求的具体制造任务。该项目的成功完成将使团队能够立即扩大规模并生产可交付的产品。通过将拟议的干扰夹持器技术与现有解决方案进行比较，实现了该项目更广泛的影响/商业潜力。可选择的机器人抓取解决方案范围广泛（价格不断上涨），从真空吸盘到基本的颚式抓取器，再到定制或专业抓取器，最后到复杂的多指手。所提出的干扰夹持器的简单性使其价格比目前实现类似性能的夹持器降低了一到两个数量级。第一个目标市场将是工业制造业，专注于物体形状变化普遍的任务（例如食品处理、制药、垃圾箱拾取和成套/组装）。这种夹具的独特定位也创造了自己的利基市场，在制造业中，由于自动化的成本过高，目前必须由人力来完成简单、重复的任务。这将使工人摆脱不舒服和危险的工作条件，并提高速度限制制造步骤的准确性和效率。每台机器人创造3.6个工作岗位，这可能会重振目前难以竞争的小型制造商。干扰夹持器的灵活性和低成本使其成为一种更灵活和可重复使用的组件，允许公司在不改变生产线或购买新设备的情况下更广泛地改变其产品。

This Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) Phase I project will develop an innovative robotic gripper that leverages the unique jamming behavior of granular materials to enable a device that can passively conform to objects of varying shape and then vacuum harden to grip them rigidly. These jamming grippers are a unique solution to the need for agile gripping and manipulation of arbitrarily shaped objects with a single gripper ? a need that occurs in manufacturing robotics, prosthetics, and increasingly in home and healthcare robotics. Initial results published in top scientific journals have demonstrated successful implementation of this technique in a laboratory setting. The research objectives of this project are aimed at bringing this innovation out of the lab and demonstrating commercial feasibility. The objectives are: 1) iterative testing and optimization of the outer membrane material for performance and durability that meet industrial thresholds; 2) testing and optimization of granular materials to improve gripper performance and manufacturability; 3) testing grippers of varying size to quantify the influence of scaling on performance; and 4) demonstrating specific manufacturing tasks requested by industry advisors and potential customers. Successful completion of this project will position the team for immediate scale up and production of deliverable units.The broader impact/commercial potential of this project is realized by comparing the proposed jamming gripper technology to existing solutions. Alternative robotic gripping solutions range (in increasing price) from vacuum suction cups, to basic jawed grippers, to customized or specialty grippers, and finally to complex multi-fingered hands. The simplicity of the proposed jamming gripper enables a one to two orders of magnitude price reduction over current grippers that achieve similar performance. The first target market will be industrial manufacturing, focusing on tasks where variations in object shape are prevalent (e.g. food handling, pharmaceuticals, bin picking, and kitting/assembly). This gripper is also uniquely positioned to create its own niche market in the simple, repetitive tasks in manufacturing that must currently be performed by human laborers due to prohibitive costs of automation. This will take workers out of uncomfortable and dangerous working conditions, and improve accuracy and efficiency for rate-limiting manufacturing steps. With 3.6 jobs created for each robot employed, this could revitalize small manufacturers struggling to compete today. The flexibility and low cost of a jamming gripper makes it a more agile and reusable component, allowing companies to vary their products more broadly without manufacturing line changes or purchases of new equipment.