Department of Chemistry and Chemical Biology, Harvard University, Cambridge, MA, USA.
Angew Chem Int Ed Engl. 2018 Apr 9;57(16):4258-4273. doi: 10.1002/anie.201800907. Epub 2018 Mar 8.
This description of "soft robotics" is not intended to be a conventional review, in the sense of a comprehensive technical summary of a developing field. Rather, its objective is to describe soft robotics as a new field-one that offers opportunities to chemists and materials scientists who like to make "things" and to work with macroscopic objects that move and exert force. It will give one (personal) view of what soft actuators and robots are, and how this class of soft devices fits into the more highly developed field of conventional "hard" robotics. It will also suggest how and why soft robotics is more than simply a minor technical "tweak" on hard robotics and propose a unique role for chemistry, and materials science, in this field. Soft robotics is, at its core, intellectually and technologically different from hard robotics, both because it has different objectives and uses and because it relies on the properties of materials to assume many of the roles played by sensors, actuators, and controllers in hard robotics.
这段关于“软机器人”的描述并不是传统意义上的综述，即对一个不断发展的领域进行全面的技术总结。相反，其目的是将软机器人描述为一个新领域——为喜欢制作“东西”并与运动和施力的宏观物体打交道的化学家和材料科学家提供机会。本文将从个人角度描述软执行器和机器人是什么，以及这类软设备如何融入更为先进的传统“硬”机器人领域。本文还将探讨软机器人如何以及为何不仅仅是对硬机器人的微小技术“调整”，并提出化学和材料科学在这一领域的独特作用。软机器人从根本上在智能和技术上有别于硬机器人，这不仅是因为它有不同的目标和用途，还因为它依赖于材料的特性来承担硬机器人中传感器、执行器和控制器的许多角色。
