Everting Soft Robot Fabric Design for Preprogrammed Trajectory Growth
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Solution Overview
Problem
Existing soft robots face challenges in navigating constrained, cluttered, or inhomogeneous environments due to sliding friction and the need for a stationary power source, and they lack the ability to efficiently follow pre-programmed trajectories during growth.
Innovation Solution
A process for designing and manufacturing an everting soft robot with a tubular structure composed of fabric patches with varying elastic characteristics and pre-tensions, allowing it to follow pre-programmed straight, curved, or axial rotation segments by distributing these patches along its circumference, enabling it to navigate complex environments.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Object-affected harmful factors
If traditional soft robots are used to navigate constrained environments, then they can move through the environment, but they experience sliding friction and require stationary power sources located far from the robot body
Solution Approach 1:
The robot body is segmented into multiple inflatable chambers that can be independently controlled. This segmentation allows the robot to divide its movement into discrete growth steps, eliminating continuous sliding friction while enabling distributed power source placement along the robot's length rather than requiring a single stationary power source far from the body.
Solution Approach 2:
The robot employs dynamic inflation and deflation of chambers to create peristaltic-like movement. This dynamic operation allows the robot to push itself forward through sequential chamber expansion, replacing static friction-based movement with dynamic volume-change-based propulsion, and enabling flexible power source positioning along the dynamic structure.
2Object-affected harmful factors
If traditional soft robots apply forces to their immediate environment to move, then they can navigate, but they become sensitive to the mechanical properties of their surroundings
Solution Approach 1:
The robot uses its own body volume changes to propel itself forward through the environment rather than relying on external forces. By inflating and deflating its chambers sequentially, the robot creates internal pressure differentials that push it forward, making its movement independent of external mechanical properties and reducing sensitivity to environmental variations.
3Ease of manufacture
If the tubular structure is made with uniform fabric patches, then manufacturing is simplified, but the robot cannot follow pre-programmed curved or rotational trajectories during growth
Solution Approach 1:
Different fabric patches are assigned to different sections of the tubular structure based on the desired growth trajectory. Patches are selected with specific elastic characteristics and pre-tension values tailored to local requirements - for example, patches with higher pre-tension in sections requiring curvature, or patches with specific grain orientations in sections requiring rotational movement. This local customization enables precise trajectory control while maintaining a modular manufacturing approach.
Solution Approach 2:
The elastic characteristics and pre-tension parameters of fabric patches are varied according to the programmed trajectory. By changing these parameters locally across different patches, the robot can follow complex paths including curves and rotations. The manufacturing process incorporates these parameter variations systematically, allowing trajectory precision without requiring completely custom patches for each section.
Applied Scientific Principles
This section explains which scientific principles are used to turn an abstract innovation direction into a practical engineering solution.
Function Achieved in This Case
The everting soft robot can efficiently traverse predefined paths by exploiting contacts on its body, reducing sensitivity to environmental mechanical properties and enabling navigation in constrained spaces without sliding friction.
Implementation Method 1
fabric patches with varying elastic characteristics and pre-tensions, allowing it to follow pre-programmed straight, curved, or axial rotation segments
Data Source
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AI summary
A process for designing and manufacturing an everting soft robot capable of growing along a pre-programmed path provides: the reconstruction of the three-dimensional CAD model of the environment in which the everting soft robot must navigate, the identification of the starting point, the end point and the obstacles to be overcome by the everting soft robot, the generation of a path avoiding obstacles, the design of tubular structure sections for everting soft robots, the choice between a plurality of first fabric patches (M1), second fabric patches (M2), third fabric patches (M3), and fourth fabric patches (M4) for each section of tubular structure, the subjecting of each fabric patch to its own state of traction, the positioning of each fabric patch in the tubular structure of the robot and the union of the plurality of fabric patches (M1, M2, M3, M4) on the basis of the design of the sections.