Inflatable Snapping Metamaterials for Next Generation Soft Machines

用于下一代软机器的充气咬合超材料

• 批准号: 505075715
• 负责人: Dr. Edoardo Milana
• 金额: --
• 依托单位: FIT Freiburger Zentrum für interaktive Werkstoffe und bioinspirierte Technologien
• 依托单位国家: 德国
• 项目类别: WBP Position
• 财政年份: 2022
• 资助国家: 德国
• 起止时间: 2021-12-31 至 2022-12-31
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://gepris.dfg.de/gepris/projekt/505075715?language=en
• 关键词: Inflatable; Snapping; Metamaterials; Next; Generation

Soft machines are mechanical devices made of soft materials and perform functions through their bodily deformation. Their benefits over traditional rigid counterparts are typically reported in terms of interaction safety, adaptability and low-cost fabrication. Soft machines can be driven by elastic inflatable actuators, which exhibit a variety of motions according to their design. Similarly, flexible mechanical metamaterials are designed to achieve desired mechanical responses, including complex nonlinear effects such as reversible snap-through instabilities. Indeed, a metamaterial is defined as an artificial material that exhibits special properties beyond the ones of its constituents. This project aims at creating a new family of soft machines by designing and fabricating inflatable snapping actuators that harness the nonlinear response of architected metamaterials. Thanks to the high tunability of the mechanical metamaterial response, novel functionalities will be encoded in the structure, enabling next generation soft machines with simplified control and embodied intelligence. In this proposal, three main objectives are targeted. The first objective is to design and fabricate an inflatable actuator with a nonlinear pressure-volume curve that allows snap-through phenomenon. As a simple inflatable shell has a linear monotonic pressure-volume response (if there are no ballooning effects), the snap-through will be induced solely by the metamaterial architecture. The second objective is to develop a methodology to design simplified control schemes by exploiting the snapping response of the actuators. This approach is named “morphological control”, as it makes use of the physical properties of the system to achieve a control task. An array of interconnected actuators will be modelled as a nonlinear fluidic network. An algorithm will be developed to invert the nonlinear fluidic network equations and obtain the system parameters based on the desired response, e.g., a specific sequenced pattern of actuation. Lastly, the previous concepts will be applied to design and fabricate a bi-modal soft robotic demonstrator that can locomote on land and water. The soft robot envisioned in this project will have a single pressure input for all the actuators and the sequences that create the locomotion patterns will be, therefore, morphologically controlled. The new designs and control principles envisaged in this proposal will be paramount to enable next generation multifunctional soft machines with higher levels of embodied intelligence.

软机械是由软材料制成的机械装置，通过其身体变形来执行功能。与传统刚性同类产品相比，它们的优势通常体现在交互安全性、适应性和低成本制造方面。软机器可以由弹性充气致动器驱动，根据其设计表现出各种运动。同样，柔性机械超材料旨在实现所需的机械响应，包括复杂的非线性效应，例如可逆突跳不稳定性。事实上，超材料被定义为一种人造材料，其表现出超出其成分的特殊性能。该项目旨在通过设计和制造利用架构超材料的非线性响应的充气折断执行器来创建新的软机器系列。由于机械超材料响应的高度可调，新颖的功能将被编码在结构中，从而使下一代软机器具有简化的控制和体现的智能。该提案提出了三个主要目标。第一个目标是设计和制造具有非线性压力-体积曲线的充气致动器，该曲线允许突弹现象。由于简单的充气壳体具有线性单调压力-体积响应（如果没有气球效应），因此突跳将仅由超材料架构引起。第二个目标是开发一种方法，通过利用执行器的捕捉响应来设计简化的控制方案。这种方法被称为“形态控制”，因为它利用系统的物理特性来实现控制任务。互连的执行器阵列将被建模为非线性流体网络。将开发一种算法来反转非线性流体网络方程并根据所需的响应（例如特定的致动序列模式）获得系统参数。最后，之前的概念将应用于设计和制造可以在陆地和水上移动的双模态软机器人演示器。该项目设想的软机器人将为所有执行器提供单一压力输入，因此创建运动模式的序列将受到形态控制。该提案中设想的新设计和控制原理对于实现具有更高水平的体现智能的下一代多功能软机至关重要。