Zhang Jingjing, Hu Hai, Liang Wenliang, Fuyang Zhijuan, Zhang Chenchu, Pan Deng
Anhui University Center for Applied Mathematics, School of Mathematical Sciences, Anhui University, Hefei 230601, China.
Information Materials and Intelligent Sensing Laboratory of Anhui Province, Anhui University, Hefei 230601, China.
Polymers (Basel). 2025 May 9;17(10):1302. doi: 10.3390/polym17101302.
Soft robots are advantageous due to their flexibility, ability to interact with humans, and multifunctional adaptability. However, developing soft robots that are unrestrained and can be reprogrammed for reversible control without causing damage remains a significant challenge. The majority of soft robots have a bilayer structure with internal stress, which limits their motion to pre-programmed anisotropic structures. Taking inspiration from pillworms found in nature, we propose an approach for controlling and reprogramming the motion of actuators using infrared light as the driver and a laser-melted paraffin wax (PW) shell as the controller. The dual-purpose shell can not only protect the actuator but can also alter its initial motion behavior to achieve multiple programming, profile modeling, object grasping, and directional crawling tasks, thereby enabling active changes to the motion strategy in response to external stimuli. This method can also be extended to other materials with similar properties and multi-stimulus responses, offering a new pathway for developing unconstrained, autonomous soft robots and intelligent devices.
软体机器人因其灵活性、与人类交互的能力以及多功能适应性而具有优势。然而，开发不受限制且可重新编程以进行可逆控制而不造成损坏的软体机器人仍然是一项重大挑战。大多数软体机器人具有带有内部应力的双层结构，这将它们的运动限制在预编程的各向异性结构中。从自然界中发现的卷甲虫获得灵感，我们提出了一种方法，使用红外光作为驱动源，并以激光熔化的石蜡（PW）外壳作为控制器，来控制和重新编程致动器的运动。这种两用外壳不仅可以保护致动器，还可以改变其初始运动行为，以实现多种编程、轮廓建模、物体抓取和定向爬行任务，从而能够根据外部刺激主动改变运动策略。该方法还可以扩展到具有类似特性和多刺激响应的其他材料，为开发无约束、自主的软体机器人和智能设备提供了一条新途径。
