CAREER: Acoustic Vortex Robots for Contactless 6-Degrees-of-Freedom Object Manipulation

该学院早期职业发展（Career）奖将资助研究，使机器人平台能够实现对纳米到毫米大小物体的非接触式、高分辨率、6自由度（6-DOF）操作，从而促进科学的进步。本项目将支持基础研究，首先开发新型机器人末端执行器，即非接触式声涡末端执行器，通过了解声涡使物体运动并找到控制运动的解决方案。该项目将开发声涡旋机器人，该机器人将利用集成在机械臂上的声涡旋末端执行器，实现非接触式6自由度物体操作，具有吸引人的特性，包括三维（3D）物体旋转、3D物体平移、高平移精度（1.5 μm）、宽平移范围（200 mm）、控制不同尺寸和材料特性的物体，以及对组织和头骨等屏障屏蔽的物体进行无创操作。该项目将加速未来生物和制造业机器人技术的发展，如处理精细的生物颗粒进行自动分选和排列单细胞进行生物打印。通过以声学物体操纵为主题的教育和推广活动，该项目将扩大未被充分代表的少数民族的参与，增加公众对科学和技术的参与，并为研究生，本科生和K-12学生提供学习和培训机会。本研究旨在通过了解声涡-涡相互作用和涡驱动物体运动，解决如何控制相互作用和如何控制物体运动的问题，开发非接触式声涡末端执行器和声涡机器人。为了实现这些目标，研究人员将首先建立理论模型来研究声学同轴和三涡相互作用，并建立数值模型来研究同轴和三涡对物体运动的影响。在此基础上，将开发同轴涡末端执行器来捕获物体并控制其双向旋转。然后将开发三涡末端执行器来控制被困物体的三维旋转。基于微型数字间换能器的末端执行器将被开发用于产生高频、高分辨率的声涡旋光束来操纵微/纳米物体。这些末端执行器将与机械臂集成，开发声学涡旋机器人，并将通过非接触式物体操作测试进行验证，例如为生物打印安排单个细胞，在仿生幻影中翻译物体，以及在组织和头骨屏障屏蔽的区域旋转物体。该奖项反映了美国国家科学基金会的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的知识价值和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。

This Faculty Early Career Development (CAREER) award will fund research that enables robotic platforms to achieve contactless, high-resolution, 6-degrees-of-freedom (6-DOF) manipulation of nano-to-millimeter-sized objects, thereby prompting the progress of science. This project will support fundamental research to first develop new robotic end effectors, namely, contactless acoustic vortex end effectors, by understanding acoustic vortex-enabled object motions and finding solutions to control the motions. This project will develop acoustic vortex robots, which will leverage acoustic vortex end effectors integrated with robotic arms to enable contactless 6-DOF object manipulation with appealing features, including three-dimensional (3D) object rotation, 3D object translation, high translation accuracy (1.5 μm), wide translation range (200 mm), control of objects with different sizes and material properties, and noninvasive manipulation of objects shielded by barriers such as tissue and skull. This project will accelerate the development of future robotic technologies for biology and manufacturing applications such as handling delicate bioparticles for automated sorting and arranging single cells for bioprinting. Through education and outreach activities with the theme of acoustic object manipulation, this project will broaden the participation of underrepresented minorities, increase public engagement with science and technology, and provide learning and training opportunities for graduate, undergraduate, and K-12 students.This research aims to develop contactless acoustic vortex end effectors and acoustic vortex robots, by understanding acoustic vortex-vortex interaction and vortex-enabled object motions and addressing the questions of how to control the interaction and how to control the object motions. To achieve these objectives, the researchers will first establish theoretical models to study acoustic coaxial- and tri-vortex interactions, and numerical models to study the effects of coaxial- and tri-vortex on object motions. Based on the modeling results, coaxial vortex end effectors will be developed to trap an object and control its bidirectional rotation. Tri-vortex end effectors will then be developed to control the 3D rotation of the trapped object. End effectors based on micro-interdigital transducers will be developed to generate high-frequency, high-resolution acoustic vortex beams for manipulating micro/nano-objects. These end effectors will be integrated with robotic arms to develop acoustic vortex robots, and they will be validated through contactless object manipulation tests, such as arranging single cells for bioprinting, translating objects inside a biomimetic phantom, and rotating objects in regions shielded by tissue and skull barriers.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.