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Spiral-Shape Fast-Moving Soft Robots |
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| Authors: | Weilei Mu Mengjiao Li Erdong Chen Yiduo Yang Jie Yin Xiaoming Tao Guijie Liu Rong Yin |
| Affiliation: | 1. College of Engineering, Ocean University of China, Qingdao, 266100 China Department of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering, North Carolina State University, Raleigh, NC, 27695 USA Contribution: Conceptualization (supporting), Funding acquisition (lead), Investigation (equal), Methodology (equal), Resources (lead), Writing - original draft (equal), Writing - review & editing (supporting);2. College of Engineering, Ocean University of China, Qingdao, 266100 China Textile Engineering, Chemistry, and Science, Wilson College of Textiles, North Carolina State University, Raleigh, NC, 27695 USA Contribution: Conceptualization (supporting), Formal analysis (lead), Investigation (lead), Methodology (equal), Software (equal), Writing - original draft (equal);3. College of Engineering, Ocean University of China, Qingdao, 266100 China Textile Engineering, Chemistry, and Science, Wilson College of Textiles, North Carolina State University, Raleigh, NC, 27695 USA Contribution: Conceptualization (supporting), Software (equal), Validation (equal), Writing - original draft (supporting);4. Textile Engineering, Chemistry, and Science, Wilson College of Textiles, North Carolina State University, Raleigh, NC, 27695 USA Contribution: Formal analysis (supporting), Investigation (supporting), Writing - original draft (supporting);5. Department of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering, North Carolina State University, Raleigh, NC, 27695 USA Contribution: Investigation (supporting), Writing - review & editing (equal);6. Institute of Textiles and Clothing, The Hong Kong Polytechnic University, Hong Kong, 999077 China Contribution: Validation (supporting), Writing - review & editing (equal);7. College of Engineering, Ocean University of China, Qingdao, 266100 China Contribution: Resources (supporting), Supervision (supporting);8. Textile Engineering, Chemistry, and Science, Wilson College of Textiles, North Carolina State University, Raleigh, NC, 27695 USA |
| Abstract: | Soft robots typically exhibit limited agility due to inherent properties of soft materials. The structural design of soft robots is one of the key elements to improve their mobility. Inspired by the Archimedean spiral geometry in nature, here, a fast-moving spiral-shaped soft robot made of a piezoelectric composite with an amorphous piezoelectric vinylidene fluoride film and a layer of copper tape is presented. The soft robot demonstrates a forward locomotion speed of 76 body length per second under the first-order resonance frequency and a backward locomotion speed of 11.26 body length per second at the third-order resonance frequency. Moreover, the multitasking capabilities of the soft robot in slope climbing, step jumping, load carrying, and steering are demonstrated. The soft robot can escape from a relatively confined space without external control and human intervention. An untethered robot with a battery and a flexible circuit (a payload of 1.665 g and a total weight of 1.815 g) can move at an absolute speed of 20 mm s−1 (1 body length per second). This study opens a new generic design paradigm for next-generation fast-moving soft robots that are applicable for multifunctionality at small scales. |
| Keywords: | fast-moving PVDFs soft robots spiral structures untethered robots |
