A Soft Continuum Robotic Arm with a Climbing Plant‐Inspired Adaptive Behavior for Minimal Sensing, Actuation, and Control Effort
A key challenge in designing soft continuum robotic arms is the realization of intelligent behavior while minimizing sensing, actuation, and control effort. This work investigates how soft continuum arms can benefit from mimicking the distribution of flexural rigidity of searcher stems in climbing p...
| Main Authors: | , , , , , |
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| Format: | Article |
| Language: | English |
| Published: |
Wiley
2024-04-01
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| Series: | Advanced Intelligent Systems |
| Subjects: | |
| Online Access: | https://doi.org/10.1002/aisy.202300537 |
| _version_ | 1797197600381730816 |
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| author | Giovanna A. Naselli Rob B. N. Scharff Marc Thielen Francesco Visentin Thomas Speck Barbara Mazzolai |
| author_facet | Giovanna A. Naselli Rob B. N. Scharff Marc Thielen Francesco Visentin Thomas Speck Barbara Mazzolai |
| author_sort | Giovanna A. Naselli |
| collection | DOAJ |
| description | A key challenge in designing soft continuum robotic arms is the realization of intelligent behavior while minimizing sensing, actuation, and control effort. This work investigates how soft continuum arms can benefit from mimicking the distribution of flexural rigidity of searcher stems in climbing plants to accomplish this goal. A modeling approach is presented to tune both the structural design and the tactile sensor design of a soft continuum arm inspired by the flexural rigidity distribution of Mandevilla cf. splendens’ searcher stems. The resulting soft continuum arm, named Mandy, can detect suitable supports along its length and twining around them using a single sensor and actuator. Through simulations and experiments, it is shown such behavior cannot be achieved with a soft continuum arm possessing uniform structural stiffness and a standard tactile sensor design. Thus, the significance of investing greater effort in structural design, leveraging biological data, to improve the design of soft continuum arms with more compact actuation and sensing hardware, is highlighted. |
| first_indexed | 2024-04-24T06:46:32Z |
| format | Article |
| id | doaj.art-58502244472d4d7ca1af189e57673e0d |
| institution | Directory Open Access Journal |
| issn | 2640-4567 |
| language | English |
| last_indexed | 2024-04-24T06:46:32Z |
| publishDate | 2024-04-01 |
| publisher | Wiley |
| record_format | Article |
| series | Advanced Intelligent Systems |
| spelling | doaj.art-58502244472d4d7ca1af189e57673e0d2024-04-22T18:07:16ZengWileyAdvanced Intelligent Systems2640-45672024-04-0164n/an/a10.1002/aisy.202300537A Soft Continuum Robotic Arm with a Climbing Plant‐Inspired Adaptive Behavior for Minimal Sensing, Actuation, and Control EffortGiovanna A. Naselli0Rob B. N. Scharff1Marc Thielen2Francesco Visentin3Thomas Speck4Barbara Mazzolai5Bioinspired Soft Robotics Lab Istituto Italiano di Tecnologia Via Morego 30 16163 Genova ItalyBioinspired Soft Robotics Lab Istituto Italiano di Tecnologia Via Morego 30 16163 Genova ItalyPlant Biomechanics Group @ Botanic Garden University of Freiburg Schänzlestraße 1 D-79104 Freiburg GermanyBioinspired Soft Robotics Lab Istituto Italiano di Tecnologia Via Morego 30 16163 Genova ItalyPlant Biomechanics Group @ Botanic Garden University of Freiburg Schänzlestraße 1 D-79104 Freiburg GermanyBioinspired Soft Robotics Lab Istituto Italiano di Tecnologia Via Morego 30 16163 Genova ItalyA key challenge in designing soft continuum robotic arms is the realization of intelligent behavior while minimizing sensing, actuation, and control effort. This work investigates how soft continuum arms can benefit from mimicking the distribution of flexural rigidity of searcher stems in climbing plants to accomplish this goal. A modeling approach is presented to tune both the structural design and the tactile sensor design of a soft continuum arm inspired by the flexural rigidity distribution of Mandevilla cf. splendens’ searcher stems. The resulting soft continuum arm, named Mandy, can detect suitable supports along its length and twining around them using a single sensor and actuator. Through simulations and experiments, it is shown such behavior cannot be achieved with a soft continuum arm possessing uniform structural stiffness and a standard tactile sensor design. Thus, the significance of investing greater effort in structural design, leveraging biological data, to improve the design of soft continuum arms with more compact actuation and sensing hardware, is highlighted.https://doi.org/10.1002/aisy.202300537continuum armsexploration by tactile sensingphysical intelligenceplant-inspired roboticsstructurally biomimetic design |
| spellingShingle | Giovanna A. Naselli Rob B. N. Scharff Marc Thielen Francesco Visentin Thomas Speck Barbara Mazzolai A Soft Continuum Robotic Arm with a Climbing Plant‐Inspired Adaptive Behavior for Minimal Sensing, Actuation, and Control Effort Advanced Intelligent Systems continuum arms exploration by tactile sensing physical intelligence plant-inspired robotics structurally biomimetic design |
| title | A Soft Continuum Robotic Arm with a Climbing Plant‐Inspired Adaptive Behavior for Minimal Sensing, Actuation, and Control Effort |
| title_full | A Soft Continuum Robotic Arm with a Climbing Plant‐Inspired Adaptive Behavior for Minimal Sensing, Actuation, and Control Effort |
| title_fullStr | A Soft Continuum Robotic Arm with a Climbing Plant‐Inspired Adaptive Behavior for Minimal Sensing, Actuation, and Control Effort |
| title_full_unstemmed | A Soft Continuum Robotic Arm with a Climbing Plant‐Inspired Adaptive Behavior for Minimal Sensing, Actuation, and Control Effort |
| title_short | A Soft Continuum Robotic Arm with a Climbing Plant‐Inspired Adaptive Behavior for Minimal Sensing, Actuation, and Control Effort |
| title_sort | soft continuum robotic arm with a climbing plant inspired adaptive behavior for minimal sensing actuation and control effort |
| topic | continuum arms exploration by tactile sensing physical intelligence plant-inspired robotics structurally biomimetic design |
| url | https://doi.org/10.1002/aisy.202300537 |
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