Bio-Inspired Robotic Cownose Ray Propelled by Electroactive Polymer Pectoral Fin

Abstract

The cownose ray (Rhinoptera bonasus) demonstrates excellent swimming capabilities; generating highly efficient thrust via flapping of dorsally flattened pectoral fins. In this paper, we present a bio-inspired and free swimming robot that mimics the swimming behavior of the cownose ray. The robot has two artificial pectoral fins to generate thrust through a twisted flapping motion. Each artificial pectoral fin consists of one ionic polymer-metal composite (IPMC) as artificial muscle in the leading edge and a passive PDMS membrane in the trailing edge. By applying voltage signal to the IPMC, the passive PDMS membrane follows the bending of IPMC with a phase delay, which leads to a twist angle on the fin. The characterization results have shown that the pectoral fin was able to generate up to 40% tip deflection and 10° twist angle with less than 1 Watt power consumption. A bio-inspired rigid body was designed using Computerized Axial Tomography (CT Scan) data of the cownose ray body and printed using a 3-dimensional printer. A light and compact on-board control unit with a lithium ion polymer battery has been developed for the free swimming robot. Experimental results have shown that the robot swam at 0.034 BL/S.

Bio-inspired aquatic robotics by untethered piezohydroelastic actuation

“…where τ is the thrust per unit width (τ = T/b) and we note from equations (30) and (31) that C τ ∝ Re 2 L . Substituting equation (29) into equation (31) gives…”

“…Another manipulation of equations (30) and (31) provides the variation of the mean thrust with modified Reynolds number as…”

Development of 2D maneuverable robotic fish propelled by multiple ionic polymer-metal composite artificial fins

“…One of the advantages of using IPMC artificial fins in a robotic fish design is to utilize the low power consumption of IPMC. Chen et al characterized the power consumption of the IPMC artificial fin [28]; however, this characterization only included the power consumed by the IPMC, not the power consumed by the driving circuit. It was discovered that the H-Bridge became hot after a few minutes of operation.…”

“…Tianxu Yang and Zheng Chen * IEEE Member Proceedings of the 2015 IEEE Conference on Robotics and Biomimetics Zhuhai, China, December 6-9, 2015 [28], [17]. The resulting robotic fish or rays only demonstrated one-dimensional (1D) swimming; 2D or 3-dimensional (3D) maneuvering capabilities were limited because they utilized only one type of IPMC-actuated artificial fin, either pectoral or caudal, which prevents these robotic fish from achieving the high maneuverability exhibited by real fish, e.g., turning, hovering, and breaking.…”

Pitching Stability Simulation Of A Bionic Cownose Ray

“…Cownose ray is a typical fish occupying these features (Parson 2011). Some researchers and engineers have been trying to understand the swimming mechanics and to explore the bio-inspired methodology in the design and development of bionic underwater vehicles mimicking this kind of fish (Cai et al 2010 andChen et al 2011;Elizabeth 2011;IMAE 2012;Wang et al 2009;Xu et al 2007;Zhou and Low 2010). As for applications of bionic robotic fish, especially for underwater detection and observation, the ability of stability performs an essential role (Anderson and Chhabra 2002;Hu et al 2006;Sefati et al 2012;Wang et al 2005).…”