Unlike octopuses, squids’ 10 tentacles aren’t all the same size. The tiny cephalopods have four pairs of tentacles that are the same length, but the other two extend and retract as needed to make it easier to grab prey. A new robot designed by engineers at Shanghai Jiao Tong University in China won’t be going out hunting anytime soon, but its three grippers can grasp and manipulate a variety of objects, just like the squid model.
A recently published paper provides further details. Cyborg Bionic SystemThe researchers combined pneumatic and cable-driven arrays to independently control the stiffness and length of three tentacle-like “fingers.” Unlike similar grasping robots that rely on molded silicon, the engineers explain in their study that each finger uses thermoplastic urethane (TPU)-coated fabric and an ultra-thin metal plate. This allows them to form a “soft-rigid hybrid origami chamber structure” that folds depending on how long or short it needs to be to grasp an object.
In pilot tests, the squid robot successfully picked up, held, and manipulated a variety of objects of widely varying size, shape, and weight, including 0.1mm-thin pieces of fabric, an apple, and a soccer ball. To customize the length and tension of each finger, the handler inflated origami chambers with positive pressure while “creating an antagonistic actuation system with cables, allowing the finger stiffness to be adjusted by actively controlling the input pressure value,” the team writes.
[Related: Why robot-makers are studying cuttlefish eyes.]
In The team’s June 3 announcementThe university explains that this kind of customization and nuance in control is “essential for tasks that require fine manipulation abilities, such as assembling delicate parts or navigating cluttered or uneven surfaces.”
Of course, for now, robotic grippers are nowhere near as agile or adaptable as their squid-inspired counterparts: Each origami chamber currently requires a “manual manufacturing process,” the engineers say in their paper, and control still requires human input. In the future, the engineers plan to optimize the manufacturing process and integrate actual sensor systems to expand its potential usefulness and enable more “sophisticated human-robot interaction.”
This versatility could make it extremely useful, with further refinements, in handling different kinds of objects, tools, or construction parts in manufacturing or medical facilities. Although such origami squid robots would likely never need to catch unsuspecting prey, origami techniques and biological inspiration could provide a dexterity that is lacking in many existing similar machines. Researchers may also take further inspiration from the effective camouflage and excellent eyesight of cephalopods.
