Soft Robotics

MIT researchers built a soft robotic gripper that uses embedded cameras and deep learning to enable tactile sensing and awareness of its positions and movements.

Roboticists at UC San Diego have developed a method using magnetic localization and a neural network to more cheaply and accurately track flexible medical robots than conventional radiation-based methods.

NC State University researchers have developed a soft robot inspired by cheetahs that can move faster on solid surfaces or in the water than previous generations of soft robots.

Soft materials, such as rubber or polymers that can endure drastic changes to their shape, are promising for applications where flexibility and shapeshifting abilities are paramount. For example, these materials can be used to create soft robots suited for specialized tasks, ranging from medical devices that could navigate around inside the body to robots for…

The new OnRobot Soft Gripper is designed to work without an external air supply. The end effector comes in three configurations, is FDA-certified, and works with the One System Solution.

Advances in soft robotics could someday allow robots to work alongside humans, helping them lift heavy objects or carrying them out of danger. As a step toward that future, Stanford University researchers have developed a new kind of soft robot that, by borrowing features from traditional robotics, is safe while still retaining the ability to…

A ‘sensorized’ soft robotic arm combines soft sensors and machine learning to know where it is in a 3D environment.

Just when it seemed like robots couldn’t get any cooler, Cornell University researchers have created a soft robot muscle that can regulate its temperature through sweating. This form of thermal management is a basic building block for enabling untethered, high-powered robots to operate for long periods of time without overheating, according to the Rob Shepherd,…

Chinese researchers recently demonstrated a robotic gripper mechanism that mimics how a sea anemone catches its prey. The bionic torus captures and releases objects by crimping its skin.

Robotic manipulation innovator Soft Robotics has raised $23 million in an “oversubscribed” Series B round, with participation from FANUC.

University of Vermont scientists have reassembled frog cells into xenobots, a programmable organism or organic robot that can move.

Soft Robotics has announced that its new mGrip soft robotic grippers will be available worldwide through FANUC’s distribution network. They will also be integrated with FANUC’s products.

Because they can move in multiple dimensions, optimizing soft robots to perform complex tasks is a huge computational challenge, but a new MIT model can help

MIT researchers have invented a way to efficiently optimize the control and design of soft robots for target tasks, which has traditionally been a monumental undertaking in computation. Soft robots have springy, flexible, stretchy bodies that can essentially move an infinite number of ways at any given moment. Computationally, this represents a highly complex “state…

Harvard University researchers have found a way to make soft actuators powerful enough to enable a RoboBee to fly and collide.

Soft Robotics has made its pneumatic grippers portable with the new coDrive technology, enabling a range of collaborative robotics applications.

MassRobotics hosted its third annual Robot Block Party in Boston, showcasing local robotics companies and giving people of all ages a chance to see robots up close.

Engineers at the University of California San Diego have developed a way to build soft robots that are compact, portable and multifunctional. The advance was made possible by creating soft, tubular actuators whose movements are electrically controlled, which makes them easy to integrate with small electronic components. As a proof of concept, engineers used these…

Researchers at the University of Toronto have created a small robot that can crawl like an inchworm. Electrothermal actuators could one day transform industries from aviation to smart wearables.

Nanobots, or microscopic robots, could change drug delivery, cancer treatment, and surgery, but much work remains to be done.

Advances in the fields of soft robotics, wearable technologies, and human/machine interfaces require a new class of stretchable materials that can change shape adaptively while relying only on portable electronics for power. Researchers at Carnegie Mellon University have developed such a material that exhibits a unique combination of high electrical and thermal conductivity with actuation…

Researchers at North Carolina State University have developed a soft technology inspired by octopuses that can sense, compute, and respond without centralized processing.