Soft Pneumatic Wearable Skin for Haptic Feedback
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Solution Overview
Problem
Current wearable robotic suits face challenges due to their rigid, bulky design, which limits comfort, safety, and practicality, and lack integrated sensing capabilities for effective haptic feedback and control, making them impractical for widespread use.
Innovation Solution
A soft, wearable, pneumatically actuated device with integrated sensing and control systems, using a bidirectional wearable skin with distributed actuator and sensing elements, and a portable power and control device that provides independent control of pressure and flow rates, enabling intuitive human-machine interaction and bi-directional communication.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Strength
If rigid, bulky robotic components are used in wearable suits, then structural strength and actuation capability are improved, but comfort, safety, and practicality deteriorate
Solution Approach 1:
The patent employs soft robotic components including flexible actuators, compliant structures, and soft materials throughout the wearable suit. These flexible elements replace rigid metallic components while maintaining necessary mechanical strength through smart material properties and innovative structural designs, enabling the suit to conform to and move with the human body for enhanced comfort and safety
Solution Approach 2:
The patent utilizes composite material systems combining multiple material properties within the soft robotic components. These composites integrate flexible polymers, shape memory materials, and other advanced materials to achieve both the required structural strength and the compliance needed for wearable comfort, resolving the contradiction between strength and ease of operation
2Strength
If rigid, bulky robotic components are used in wearable suits, then structural strength and actuation capability are improved, but safety deteriorates
Solution Approach 1:
The patent employs soft robotic components including flexible actuators, compliant structures, and soft materials throughout the wearable suit. These flexible elements replace rigid metallic components while maintaining necessary mechanical strength through smart material properties and innovative structural designs, enabling the suit to conform to and move with the human body for enhanced comfort and safety
Solution Approach 2:
The patent utilizes composite material systems combining multiple material properties within the soft robotic components. These composites integrate flexible polymers, shape memory materials, and other advanced materials to achieve both the required structural strength and the compliance needed for wearable comfort, resolving the contradiction between strength and ease of operation
3Adaptability or versatility
If traditional sensing and actuation components are integrated into wearable devices, then functionality is improved, but device complexity increases
Solution Approach 1:
The patent integrates sensing, actuation, and control functions into unified soft robotic components. The soft actuators incorporate embedded sensors that directly measure mechanical deformation and force, eliminating the need for separate sensing systems. This merging of functions into single multifunctional elements reduces overall device complexity while maintaining full functionality
Solution Approach 2:
The soft robotic components are designed to perform multiple functions simultaneously - actuators provide both actuation and sensing capabilities, structural elements provide both support and tactile feedback. This multi-functionality reduces the total number of components needed while achieving comprehensive functionality for human-machine interaction
4Ease of operation
If soft robotic components are used in wearable suits, then comfort and safety are improved, but actuation capability deteriorates
Solution Approach 1:
The patent employs smart materials that can dynamically change their mechanical parameters including stiffness, strength, and actuation force. These materials allow the soft robotic components to provide gentle forces for comfort during normal wear while being capable of generating sufficient actuation forces when needed, achieving both comfort and adequate actuation capability through parameter modulation
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 solution provides a comfortable, safe, and practical wearable system capable of modulating force, pressure, and vibrotactile feedback, enabling closed-loop control and intuitive interaction, enhancing communication and control experiences without the need for external power sources.
Implementation Method 1
a first pump configured to generate a first fluid pressure... a second pump configured to generate a second fluid pressure... a first channel configured to allow flow of the first fluid... a second channel configured to allow flow of the second fluid
Data Source
AI summary
A fully wearable system used for communication and information transfer between two users or between a user and a machine to render an effective and intuitive physical interface for combined input and output functions, the fully wearable system including a bidirectional wearable skin including distributed actuator and sensing elements, the actuator and sensing elements including a multimodal actuation layer and a sensing layer, the bidirectional wearable skin being flexible and stretchable, and a portable control device for controlling the distributed actuator and sensing elements, and reading signals from the sensing layer, the portable control device is configured to perform pixilated actuation for both micro- and macrostimulation of a body of a wearer by an actuation frequency and stimulation amplitude.