- Title
- Design, modeling, fabrication and control of fluid-driven bioinspired soft actuators and robots
- Creator
- Dos Santos Xavier, Matheus
- Relation
- University of Newcastle Research Higher Degree Thesis
- Resource Type
- thesis
- Date
- 2023
- Description
- Research Doctorate - Doctor of Philosophy (PhD)
- Description
- Soft robotics is a rapidly growing field where the robots are made of flexible materials and usually follow a bioinspired design. Soft fluidic actuators constitute the building blocks of soft robots that can achieve motions such as climbing, swimming, and crawling. Given their high compliance and dexterity, fluid-driven soft robots are used in applications such as minimally invasive surgery, wearable robotics, implantable devices, grippers and parallel manipulators. However, the complex geometries of soft fluidic actuators and the strong nonlinearities associated with their materials and actuation lead to difficult modeling, sensing and control. Although fluid-driven soft actuators and robots have been extensively used in the literature, few works have considered the impact of the pneumatic system on the soft actuator performance and included the pressure dynamics in the development of control strategies. While the actuation mode, force, and displacement are governed by the actuator design and loading conditions, the actuation speed is also largely determined by the pressure and flow dynamics of the soft pneumatic actuator. This thesis describes the design, modeling, fabrication and control of fluid-driven soft actuators and robots, with a focus on pneumatic actuation. A number of molded silicone rubber actuators are presented and novel designs for monolithic omnidirectional actuators are introduced that are suited for direct fabrication using additive manufacturing methods. From a modeling perspective, guidelines and a comprehensive database for finite element modeling of soft fluidic actuators are presented. In addition, a mixed steady-transient formulation for fully-coupled 3D fluid-structure interaction simulations is introduced, which enables the modeling of both internal and external fluid flow in underwater applications. From an actuation and characterization perspective, analytical and simulation models are developed for pneumatic systems in soft robotics, which enables a systematic approach to actuator design and the optimization of components and pneumatic circuits. The final contributions are model-based nonlinear feedback controllers for pressure control of soft pneumatic actuators, and a combined nonlinear control and estimation approach for precise bending control using a model which includes both the motion and pressure dynamics. The results of this thesis provide soft roboticists with improved tools for actuator design and modeling, and methods for optimizing the performance of fluid-driven actuators.
- Subject
- soft robotics; soft actuator; bioinspired robots; design
- Identifier
- http://hdl.handle.net/1959.13/1514264
- Identifier
- uon:56836
- Rights
- Copyright 2023 Matheus Dos Santos Xavier
- Language
- eng
- Full Text
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| View Details Download | ATTACHMENT01 | Thesis | 9 MB | Adobe Acrobat PDF | View Details Download | ||
| View Details Download | ATTACHMENT02 | Abstract | 124 KB | Adobe Acrobat PDF | View Details Download |