Soft Actuators: Kirigami‐Based Light‐Induced Shape‐Morphing and Locomotion (Adv. Mater. 7/2020)

Cheng, Yu‐Chieh; Lu, Hao‐Chuan; Lee, Xuan; Zeng, Hao; Priimägi, Arri

doi:10.1002/adma.202070047

Cited by 20 publications

(28 citation statements)

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“…Zeng and coworkers fabricate a kirigami-based rolling robot, and it can climb on a hill with 6° slope and finally drop at 7° slope. [24] Cai group reported a cylindrical elastomer rod that can roll up on a hot surface with a tilting angle around 11°. [7] Compared to previously reported robots, PHSR has similar climbing ability, but exhibits better maneuverable locomotion.…”

Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Helical Liquid Crystal Elastomer Miniature Robot with Photocontrolled Locomotion

Zhao

Wang

Fan

et al. 2022

Adv Materials Technologies

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responsiveness, and high degree of freedom. [4] It is of primary importance to choose appropriate materials to design and fabricate the soft body of robot. Several materials are used to prepare soft robots, including hydrogel, liquid crystal elastomer (LCE), shape-memory polymer, dielectric elastomer and supramolecular. [5] Among them, LCE can enhance the ability of soft robots to adapt to various complex environments and perform specific tasks in practical applications. [6] Although substantial progress has been made in the design and fabrication of LCE soft robots, such as self-excited locomotor [7] and selfrolling LCE. [8] Current soft robots based on LCE are still simple in structure (usually thin film or strip), presenting limited functions and actuation performances. [9] Therefore, it is especially necessary to design and fabricate LCE robots with innovative structures and features. As a remarkable feature in biology, helical structures with the advantages of architectural aesthetics and functions are ubiquitous, such as double-stranded DNA molecular and alphahelix conformation protein molecules. [10] Moreover, helical structures, which are common motifs across plant systems from cellulose fiber to seed pot and tendril, [11] enable plants to change shape, climb walls, seed dispersal and realize several motions. [12] Inspired by these natural examples, actuators with helical structures have been developed in microscale swimmers and soft robots. [13] Moreover, for the design of helical actuators, several fabrication strategies have been developed involving two-photon polymerization, 3D photolithography, [14] and two-step polymerization method. [15] Several helical actuators have been prepared using LCE, as the LCE is capable of undergoing larger macroscopic shape changes in response to external stimuli such as magnetism, temperature, humidity, and light. [16] As a clean and versatile energy source, light is usually used to power soft robots. Numerous of light responsive LCE have been prepared to design soft actuators, which can be remote, instant, precise, and contactless controlled by light. [5c] Based on the advanced shape-morphing features, various light responsive LCE actuators with helical structure have been designed to undergo surprising motions. Depending on dynamic covalent bonds, Ikeda [17] and Ji [18] have fabricated helical LCE actuators which can reshape and achieve light-responsive helicoid and three-helix reversible structures respectively. Additionally, the method of cutting along different orientations of mesogens is an effective Miniature liquid crystal elastomer (LCE) based soft robots with multidirectional locomotion ability and multifunctionality have captured the extensive interest of researchers for a wide range of potential applications. Generally, the subsistent actuation modes for most LCE soft robots present several simple shape-changing under external stimuli. Although elaborately designed for complicated structures, they still achieve limited mobility, restricting the practic...

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Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Helical Liquid Crystal Elastomer Miniature Robot with Photocontrolled Locomotion

Zhao

Wang

Fan

et al. 2022

Adv Materials Technologies

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Section: Light-responsive Active Mechanical Metamaterialsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…As shown in Figure 7e, the centipede robot moves forward and turns under the navigation of the external light source. Different from the common designs of the photo-sensitive materials simply as strip-like or wire-connection structures with limited freedom of movement, Cheng et al [50] employed kirigami architecture to design an interesting rolling robot. They adopted the design of the metamaterial similar to a ratchet wheel, to make the robot roll and climb slopes with high efficiency (Figure 7f).…”

Section: Light-responsive Active Mechanical Metamaterialsmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Recent Progress in Active Mechanical Metamaterials and Construction Principles

et al. 2021

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Active mechanical metamaterials (AMMs) (or smart mechanical metamaterials) that combine the configurations of mechanical metamaterials and the active control of stimuli-responsive materials have been widely investigated in recent decades. The elaborate artificial microstructures of mechanical metamaterials and the stimulus response characteristics of smart materials both contribute to AMMs, making them achieve excellent properties beyond the conventional metamaterials. The micro and macro structures of the AMMs are designed based on structural construction principles such as, phase transition, strain mismatch, and mechanical instability. Considering the controllability and efficiency of the stimuli-responsive materials, physical fields such as, the temperature, chemicals, light, electric current, magnetic field, and pressure have been adopted as the external stimuli in practice. In this paper, the frontier works and the latest progress in AMMs from the aspects of the mechanics and materials are reviewed. The functions and engineering applications of the AMMs are also discussed. Finally, existing issues and future perspectives in this field are briefly described. This review is expected to provide the basis and inspiration for the follow-up research on AMMs.

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“…Liquid-crystal elastomer elements can be fabricated in the scales from centimeters (10-100 µm thick films, made in glass cells) to micrometers (with one-or two-photon laser photolithography [20]). Simple light-powered actuators can contract, bend, and twist, and more complex modes of deformations are also possible [21][22][23]. Engineering the molecular alignment led to demonstration of a 5 mm diameter rotary motor that uses a travelling deformation in a ring-shaped rotor, frictionally coupled to the stator-similar to the piezo motors used in autofocus camera lenses [24].…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Photo-Mechanical Response Dynamics of Liquid Crystal Elastomer Linear Actuators

2020

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With continuous miniaturization of many technologies, robotics seems to be lagging behind. While the semiconductor technologies operate confidently at the nanometer scale and micro-mechanics of simple structures (MEMS) in micrometers, autonomous devices are struggling to break the centimeter barrier and have hardly colonized smaller scales. One way towards miniaturization of robots involves remotely powered, light-driven soft mechanisms based on photo-responsive materials, such as liquid crystal elastomers (LCEs). While several simple devices have been demonstrated with contracting, bending, twisting, or other, more complex LCE actuators, only their simple behavior in response to light has been studied. Here we characterize the photo-mechanical response of a linear light-driven LCE actuator by measuring its response to laser beams with varying power, pulse duration, pulse energy, and the energy spatial distribution. Light absorption decrease in the actuator over time is also measured. These results are at the foundation of further development of soft, light-driven miniature mechanisms and micro-robots.

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Soft Actuators: Kirigami‐Based Light‐Induced Shape‐Morphing and Locomotion (Adv. Mater. 7/2020)

Cited by 20 publications

References 0 publications

Helical Liquid Crystal Elastomer Miniature Robot with Photocontrolled Locomotion

Helical Liquid Crystal Elastomer Miniature Robot with Photocontrolled Locomotion

Recent Progress in Active Mechanical Metamaterials and Construction Principles

Photo-Mechanical Response Dynamics of Liquid Crystal Elastomer Linear Actuators

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