EFRI C3 SoRo: Muscle-like Cellular Architectures and Compliant, Distributed Sensing and Control for Soft Robots

该项目将为软机器人的设计和建造创造一种系统和可扩展的方法。与传统的刚性机器人相比，软式机器人具有许多潜在的优势，例如能够安全地与人和他们的周围环境互动。该项目将通过探索受自然肌肉启发的模块化配置，加快实用软机器人的部署。肌肉结构即使在没有僵硬的骨骼的情况下也可以实现非凡的灵巧和操纵，大象的鼻子、头足类动物的触须和哺乳动物的舌头就是突出的例子。生物肌肉由成百上千个单独的执行单元和多个感知通道组成。这项研究将从生物肌肉的结构中获得灵感，构建灵活、高度可控的执行器，将分布式传感、计算和通信贯穿始终。该项目从生物学中获得灵感，用于研究和开发一种新型的模块化和层次化排列的软机器人。将开发出柔软的、类似肌肉细胞的单元，这些单元可以廉价地制造成各种尺寸，并批量实施，以生产定制的顺应和连续的机器人结构。将探索利用简单的线性致动器来产生复杂空间变形的方法。将评估在整个软结构中实施被动加强元件，例如纤维，以相对于仅由软结构和执行器所能产生的输出运动和刚度来改进输出运动和刚度。研究小组还将通过开发基于电场和磁场的传感器来研究这些系统的传感、电源和控制，这些传感器不需要广泛的布线。最后，研究小组将研究柔软的肌肉状结构的建模和控制，以便能够有效地规划和执行复杂的机械操作和移动任务。拟议的软机器人无线能量、传感和控制的新方法有可能广泛适用于许多软机器人体系结构，并改变该领域常用的方法。该奖项反映了NSF的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的智力优势和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。

This project will create a systematic and scalable approach to the design and construction of soft robots. Soft robots have many potential advantages over traditional rigid robots, such as being able to interact safely with people and their surroundings. This project will accelerate the deployment of practical soft robots by exploring modular configurations inspired by natural muscles. Muscular structures can achieve extraordinary feats of dexterity and manipulation even in the absence of a rigid skeleton, with elephant trunks, cephalopod tentacles, and mammalian tongues as prominent examples. Biological muscles operate with hundreds to thousands of individual actuating units and multiple channels for sensing. This research will take inspiration from the structure of biological muscle to construct dexterous, flexible and highly controllable actuators, with distributed sensing, computation, and communication integrated throughout. This project draws inspiration from biology for the investigation and development of a new class of soft robots that are modular and hierarchically arranged. Soft, muscle-cell-like units will be developed that can be inexpensively fabricated at a range of sizes, and implemented en masse to produce customized compliant and continuum robotic structures. Methods will be explored to utilize simple linear actuators to produce complex spatial deformation. Implementation of passive stiffening elements, such as fibers, throughout the soft structures will be evaluated for improving output motion and stiffness relative to what can be produced by the soft structure and actuators alone. The research team will also investigate sensing, power, and control of these systems through the development of electric and magnetic field-based sensors that obviate the need for extensive wiring. Finally, the research team will investigate the modeling and control of the soft, muscle-like structures in order to enable effective planning and execution of mechanically complex manipulation and locomotion tasks. The proposed new approaches for wireless power, sensing, and control of soft robots have the potential to be broadly applicable to many soft robotic architectures and to change the approaches commonly utilized in the field.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.