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fliptop [soylentnews.org] writes:

[R]esearchers at Carnegie Mellon University have created soft robots that can seamlessly shift from walking to swimming, for example, or crawling to rolling [cmu.edu]:

"We were inspired by nature to develop a robot that can perform different tasks and adapt to its environment without adding actuators or complexity," said Dinesh K. Patel [cmu.edu], a post-doctoral fellow in the Morphing Matter Lab [cmu.edu] in the School of Computer Science'sHuman-Computer Interaction Institute [cmu.edu]. "Our bistable actuator is simple, stable and durable, and lays the foundation for future work on dynamic, reconfigurable soft robotics."

The bistable actuator [cmu.edu] is made of 3D-printed soft rubber containing shape-memory alloy springs that react to electrical currents by contracting, which causes the actuator to bend. The team used this bistable motion to change the actuator or robot's shape. Once the robot changes shape, it is stable until another electrical charge morphs it back to its previous configuration.

[...] The actuators require only a hundred millisecond of electrical charge to change their shape, and they are durable. The team had a person ride a bicycle over one of the actuators a few times and changed their robots' shapes hundreds of times to demonstrate durability.

In the future, the robots could be used in rescue situations or to interact with sea animals or coral. Using heat-activated springs in the actuators could open up applications in environmental monitoring, haptics, and reconfigurable electronics and communication.

Video [youtube.com] of the robot in action.

Related:

• Scientists Unveil Bionic Robo-Fish to Remove Microplastics From Seas [soylentnews.org]
• New Stretchable, Self-Healing and Illuminating Electronic Material for Wearables and Soft Robots [soylentnews.org]
• A Soft Robotic Insect That Survives Being Flattened by a Fly Swatter [soylentnews.org]
• Rubbery Figures: Scientists Create an Entirely Soft Robot [soylentnews.org]
• "Soft Muscled" Robots Could Perform Delicate Tasks [soylentnews.org]

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