New research shows a smarter way to build artificial muscles for soft robots
From left: Professor Hamed Shahsavan and MASc student Matthew Scarfo
A research team led by Nanotechnology Engineering (NE) instructor Professor Hamed Shahsavan has developed a new process to reinforce smart, rubber-like materials—paving the way for their use as artificial muscles in robots, potentially replacing rigid motors and pumps.
The research group incorporated liquid crystals (LCs)—commonly used in electronic displays and sensors—into liquid crystal elastomers (LCEs), which serve as promising materials for constructing soft robots.
The LCEs go through a huge shape-change when heated, in a programmable manner. When a small amount of LCs are mixed with LCEs, they become stiffer and up to nine times stronger than before.
“This method is the simplest yet the most robust proven strategy to stiffen LCEs without sacrificing their programmable nature,” says Shahsavan, Director of the Smart Materials for Advanced Robotic Technologies-Lab. “The process enhances the materials’ mechanical performance and makes them better suited for applications like artificial muscles in soft robotics.”
Professor Tizazu Mekonnen, a chemical engineering professor at the University of Waterloo, MASc students Sahad Vasanji, and Matthew Scarfo, Professor M.O. Saed from the University of Cambridge, and Professor Antal Jakli from Kent State University were part of the research group.
The research group's next steps are to utilize these materials as inks for 3D printing of artificial muscles.
The study, Stiffening Liquid Crystal Elastomers with Liquid Crystal Inclusions was recently published in Advanced Materials Journal.