The 85th Meeting of the Israel Chemical Society

Printed flexible actuators for soft robotics

Ela Sachyani Keneth Michael Layani Rama Lieberman Shlomo Magdassi
Casali Center of Applied Chemistry, Institute of Chemistry and the Center for Nanoscience and Nanotechnology, The Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Jerusalem, Israel

Soft robots are newly developed devices which have high impact for various fields such as defense industry and agriculture. These soft robots are made of flexible actuators that form delicate movements with a simple mechanism. The main challenge is to fabricate flexible actuators that achieve large movements, towards fabrication of a soft walking robot.

There are various types of flexible actuators with different operation mechanisms. One type is the electro-thermal actuators (ETA`s), which are structured as bi-layer devices in which the movement is caused by differences in thermal expansion coefficients of the two layers. In carbon nanotubes (CNT) based actuators, one layer is composed of CNTs which functions as an electrical heater and the other is a flexible polymer.

In this study, new three layered structured electro-thermal actuators that perform large movements are presented, while combining polymers with various mechanical properties, including shape memory polymers that enable complex movements. The effect of the properties of the third polymeric layer, such as layer composition, thickness and stiffness, on the movement of the actuator is studied, and actuators with unique out-of-the-plan movements are presented.

In addition, the study presents fabrication of 3D printed ferrofluid-based actuators, studying the effect of the ferrofluid flow and the mechanical properties of the polymeric materials on the obtained movement. Actuators mimicking a human hand and a worm are demonstrated.

  1. Sachyani, E.; Layani, M.; Tibi, G.; Avidan, T.; Degani, A.; Magdassi, S., Enhanced Movement of CNT-Based Actuators by a Three-Layered Structure with Controlled Resistivity. Sensors and Actuators B: Chemical 2017, 252, 1071-1077.
  2. Sachyani Keneth, ; Epstein, A. R.; Soreni Harari, M.; St. Pierre, R.; Magdassi, S.; Bergbreiter, S., 3D Printed Ferrofluid Based Soft Actuators. Accepted to Robotics and Automation (ICRA), IEEE International Conference, 2019.
  3. Sachyani Keneth, E; Scalet, G.; Layani, M.; Tibi, G.; Degani, A.; Auricchio, F.; Magdassi, S.; Pre-programed tri-layer electro-thermal actuators composed of shape memory polymer and CNTs, submitted to Soft Robotics, 2018.








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