Gallium‐based liquid metal alloys (LMAs) are extensively studied and used recently due to their excellent fluidity, high conductivity, and low evaporation pressure. Nonwettable and nonsticky liquid metal marbles (LMMs) are also developed to address the stickiness issue of oxidized LMAs in air. Current LMMs, however, lack acceptable controllability, shape stability, and robustness, greatly limiting their practical application. Here, a magnetically controllable liquid metal marble (MCLMM) that is noncorrosive and nonsticky, and exhibits good elasticity and mechanical robustness, is presented. The as‐obtained MCLMM consists of a soft liquid metal core coated with a mixture of ferronickel (FN) and polyethylene (PE) microparticles. This combined structure shows excellent magnetic controllability, good elasticity, and favorable mechanical robustness, as demonstrated by contact angle measurements, rolling angle measurements, corrosive testing, magnetically actuated locomotion, and impact and bounce tests. The MCLMM also possesses satisfying stability in air and stability against temperature changing. In addition, its capabilities are demonstrated as a robotic motor, controllable obstacle cleaner, and a flexible switch for circuits, which shows the potential for MCLMM applications in robotic locomotion and manipulation, electronic circuits, and beyond.
Poly(3,4‐ethylenedioxythiophene):poly(styrene sulfonate) (PEDOT:PSS) is one of the most successful conducting polymers in terms of commercialization. A method to readily obtain highly conductive and transparent PEDOT:PSS films is urgently needed. A simple method is introduced to enhance the conductivity of such films dramatically. By adding a series of mineral acids into the PEDOT:PSS aqueous solution directly, the conductivity is enhanced by 3–4 orders of magnitude. Mechanistic study reveals that the conductivity enhancement is dependent on boiling point, pKa value, softness parameter, and oxidability of the dopant acid. Specifically, acids with high boiling point, low pKa, and low softness parameter are able to induce phase separation between PEDOT and PSS, leading to secondary doping. If the dopant acid exhibits strong oxidability, the conductivity can also be enhanced via primary doping. H2SO4‐doped PEDOT:PSS films exhibit the highest conductivity of 2244 S cm−1. These films are employed as the transparent electrodes of poly(3‐hexylthiophene‐2,5‐diyl) (P3HT)‐based organic photovoltaic cells, and the power conversation efficiency reaches 3.13%. These results suggest direct acid doping of PEDOT:PSS solution is a facile approach to obtain highly flexible transparent electrodes.
Jumping is an important locomotion function to extend navigation range, overcome obstacles, and adapt to unstructured environments. In that sense, continuous jumping and direction adjustability can be essential properties for terrestrial robots with multimodal locomotion. However, only few soft jumping robots can achieve rapid continuous jumping and controlled turning locomotion for obstacle crossing. Here, we present an electrohydrostatically driven tethered legless soft jumping robot capable of rapid, continuous, and steered jumping based on a soft electrohydrostatic bending actuator. This 1.1 g and 6.5 cm tethered soft jumping robot is able to achieve a jumping height of 7.68 body heights and a continuous forward jumping speed of 6.01 body lengths per second. Combining two actuator units, it can achieve rapid turning with a speed of 138.4° per second. The robots are also demonstrated to be capable of skipping across a multitude of obstacles. This work provides a foundation for the application of electrohydrostatic actuation in soft robots for agile and fast multimodal locomotion.
Previous studies have revealed the influence of various lattice structures on the material density and mechanical properties. However, the majority of the topologies that are considered as study objects directly refer to metal/non-crystal lattice cell configurations. Therefore, this paper proposes a configuration generation approach for generating a lattice structure, which can obtain a lattice configuration that enjoys the advantages of both ultra-low weight and favorable mechanical properties. Based on this approach, a new type of face-centered cubic lattice (all face-centered cubic, AFCC) structure with comprehensively optimal properties in terms of mass and mechanical properties is obtained. The experimental samples are formed with Ti6Al4V by the selective laser melting (SLM) method. Quasi-static uniaxial compression performance experiments and finite element analysis (FEA) are conducted on an AFCC structure and the control group body-centered cubic (BCC) structure. The results demonstrates that our optimized AFCC lattice structure is superior to the BCC structure, with elastic modulus and yield limit increases of 143% and 120%, respectively. For the same degree of deformation, the energy absorbed increases approximately 2.4 times. The AFCC demonstrates significant advantages in terms of its mechanical properties and anti-explosion impact resistance while maintaining favorable ultra-low weight, which validates the hypothesis that the proposed configuration generation approach can provide guidance for the design and further research on ultra-light lattice structures in related fields.
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