Intelligent Liquid Integrated Functional Entity: A Basic Way to Innovate Future Advanced Biomimetic Soft Robotics

Abstract

The liquid is an essential component of natural creatures with profound capacities in assisting homeostatic regulation of physiological functions. However, its participation in more diverse biological behaviors, such as intelligence, motion, energy, etc., is seriously neglected and is undisclosed thus far. Herein, it is considered whether liquid systems can offer pivotal hints in the development of intelligent machines. Starting from this core point, a basic conjecture is proposed that specifically equips a robotic system with liquid that brings about revolutionary design of intelligent systems and plays an elementary role in molding future advanced soft robots. Through a comparative analogy between artificially made machines and natural animals, the basic category of the so-termed Intelligent Liquid Integrated Functional Entity (I-LIFE) is drafted and thus enabled. Then, functions of such unconventional robotic liquid are expounded from five aspects, including motion, energy supply, material performance tuning, sensing, and intelligence, respectively. Typical application examples are also illustrated. Furthermore, a group of intelligent liquids are recommended as candidates for developing future robotic systems. The fundamental scientific and technological challenges lying behind these recommendations are outlined. Finally, prospects of I-LIFE are pointed out, which stimulates the increasing design of a future generation of innovative intelligent robotic systems.

Liquid Cybernetic Systems: The Fourth‐Order Cybernetics

“…The said artificial liquid‐state cybernetic systems have also been identified as Intelligent Liquid Integrated Functional Entity (I‐LIFE), and their development has been pointed out to require focusing on their exclusive methods and properties, rather than progressing through a mere modification of conventional cybernetic (solid state) systems. [ 24 ] We totally embrace this remark, as the reader will understand from the following matter. From the perspective of human‐centric research, the purpose of developing cybernetic systems is that of expanding our own possibilities, using materials and devices that can allow surviving where our bare body is limited.…”

Artificial Intelligence of Things (AIoT) Enabled Virtual Shop Applications Using Self‐Powered Sensor Enhanced Soft Robotic Manipulator

“…By considering the large deformability of the soft robots, flexible tactile and strain sensors [ 44 , 45 , 46 , 47 , 48 , 49 , 50 , 51 , 52 , 53 , 54 , 55 , 56 , 57 , 58 , 59 , 60 , 61 , 62 , 63 , 64 ] have been developed frequently due to the better compatibility compared to the conventional rigid sensors, i.e., potentiometer and encoder. For instance, Goldoni et al.…”

A novel MXene-based high-performance flexible pressure sensor for detection of human motion

“…With the rapid development of science and technology, flexible wearable sensors have been utilized as core components of signal acquisition, thereby stimulating great research interest and wide application in fields of bioelectronic devices [1,2], smart homes [3], electronic skin [4][5][6], intelligent robotics [7,8], and human-computer interaction [9,10], among others. According to the working mechanism, flexible pressure sensors can be divided into piezoresistive [11][12][13], capacitive [14], piezoelectric [15], and triboelectric [16,17].…”