2022 Fiscal Year Annual Research Report
Multimode Frictional Anisotropic Skin for Supporting Locomotion of A Snake-like Soft-bodied Robot on Various Frictional Ground Surfaces
| Project/Area Number |
20K14690
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| Research Institution | The University of Tokyo |
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Principal Investigator |
タ デゥックトゥン 東京大学, 大学院情報理工学系研究科(工学部), 助教 (20869226)
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| Project Period (FY) |
2020-04-01 – 2023-03-31
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| Keywords | bistable structure / snake-like soft-robot / anisotropic friction / programmable skin |
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| Outline of Annual Research Achievements |
In 2022, our research project focused on investigating the behavior of a programmable frictional skin for a snake-like soft-bodied robot. One sub-project involved designing, simulating, and evaluating the performance of a 3D-printed bistable structure to dynamically switch the mode of the robot's frictional skin.
During the process of designing bistable structures for the robotic skin, we studied the performance of an origami-based bistable structure (waterbomb) and used that structure to create a lightweight origami jumper that can jump more than 100 times its body height. We presented this finding in a paper at ICRA 2022 (DOI:10.1109/ICRA46639.2022.9812002).
We further studied bistable structures with 3D-printed flexible materials to find ways to integrate the structure into the robotic skin. We discovered that it is possible to tessellate the surface of a robotic skin with controllable frictional cells, making the soft robot more adaptive to the contacted surface. This breakthrough lays the foundation for further exploration of the interaction between soft robots and their surrounding environment. We have submitted a paper detailing our findings to IROS 2023, and it is currently under review.
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