- Applications of Smart Materials and Artificial Muscles in Robotic Surgery

2014 ◽  
pp. 166-181
2016 ◽  
Vol 97 ◽  
pp. 93-99
Author(s):  
Jin Lian Hu ◽  
Harishkumar Narayana

Materials, structures and systems, responsive to an external stimulus are smart and adaptive to our human demands. Among smart materials, polymers with shape memory effect are at the forefront of research leading to comprehensive publications and wide applications. In this paper, we extend the concept of shape memory polymers to stress memory ones, which have been discovered recently. Like shape memory, stress memory represents a phenomenon where the stress in a polymer can be programmed, stored and retrieved reversibly with an external stimulus such as temperature and magnetic field. Stress memory may be mistaken as the recovery stress which was studied quite broadly. Our further investigation also reveals that stress memory is quite different from recovery stress containing multi-components including elastic and viscoelastic forces in addition to possible memory stress. Stress memory could be used into applications such as sensors, pressure garments, massage devices, electronic skins and artificial muscles. The current revelation of stress memory potentials is emanated from an authentic application of memory fibres, films, and foams in the smart compression devices for the management of chronic and therapeutic disorders.


2011 ◽  
Vol 410 ◽  
pp. 25-25
Author(s):  
Jin Song Leng

Stimulus-active polymers can change their shapes with respect to configuration or dimension upon exposure to a particular stimulus such as heat, electricity, light, magnetic, solvent and pH value. These unique characteristics enable stimulus-active polymers to be used in a myriad of fields, including clothing manufacturing, automobile engineering, medical treatment, and aerospace engineering. Stimulus-active polymers can be applied in smart textiles and apparels, intelligent medical instruments and auxiliaries, artificial muscles, biomimetic devices, heat shrinkable materials for electronics packaging, micro-electro-mechanical systems, self-deployable sun sails in spacecrafts, miniature manipulator, actuators and sensors, and many more. This paper presents some recent progress of soft smart materials and their applications. Special emphasis is focused upon shape memory polymer (SMP), electro-active polymer (EAP) for aerospace engineering such as space deployable structures and morphing aircraft, which has highlighted the need for development of these materials. A detailed overview of development in these smart soft materials, of which the undergoing and future applications are used in adaptive structures and active control, is presented. The paper concludes with a short discussion for multi-functional soft smart materials and their composites that are expected to extend the range of development and applications available to the related researches and engineers.


2015 ◽  
Vol 9 (1) ◽  
pp. 92-102 ◽  
Author(s):  
H Derar ◽  
M Shahinpoor

Hip replacement surgery has gone through tremendous evolution since the first procedure in 1840. In the past five decades the advances that have been made in technology, advanced and smart materials innovations, surgical techniques, robotic surgery and methods of fixations and sterilization, facilitated hip implants that undergo multiple design revolutions seeking the least problematic implants and a longer survivorship. Hip surgery has become a solution for many in need of hip joint remedy and replacement across the globe. Nevertheless, there are still long-term problems that are essential to search and resolve to find the optimum implant. This paper reviews several recent patents on hip replacement surgery. The patents present various designs of prostheses, different materials as well as methods of fixation. Each of the patents presents a new design as a solution to different issues ranging from the longevity of the hip prostheses to discomfort and inconvenience experienced by patients in the long-term.


Molecules ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 25 (18) ◽  
pp. 4246 ◽  
Author(s):  
Yujie Chen ◽  
Chi Chen ◽  
Hafeez Ur Rehman ◽  
Xu Zheng ◽  
Hua Li ◽  
...  

Shape-memory materials are smart materials that can remember an original shape and return to their unique state from a deformed secondary shape in the presence of an appropriate stimulus. This property allows these materials to be used as shape-memory artificial muscles, which form a subclass of artificial muscles. The shape-memory artificial muscles are fabricated from shape-memory polymers (SMPs) by twist insertion, shape fixation via Tm or Tg, or by liquid crystal elastomers (LCEs). The prepared SMP artificial muscles can be used in a wide range of applications, from biomimetic and soft robotics to actuators, because they can be operated without sophisticated linkage design and can achieve complex final shapes. Recently, significant achievements have been made in fabrication, modelling, and manipulation of SMP-based artificial muscles. This paper presents a review of the recent progress in shape-memory polymer-based artificial muscles. Here we focus on the mechanisms of SMPs, applications of SMPs as artificial muscles, and the challenges they face concerning actuation. While shape-memory behavior has been demonstrated in several stimulated environments, our focus is on thermal-, photo-, and electrical-actuated SMP artificial muscles.


2010 ◽  
Vol 654-656 ◽  
pp. 2079-2082
Author(s):  
Christine M. Scala ◽  
Matthew E. Ibrahim ◽  
Alan R. Wilson ◽  
Darren P. Edwards ◽  
V. Tan Truong

This paper overviews some recent S&T innovations in smart materials and structures at the Australian Defence Science and Technology Organisation (DSTO) under a Corporate Enabling Research Program (CERP) on Signatures, Materials and Energy. The CERP program includes development and transitioning of technology across the maritime, air and land domains, with the major focus of the smart materials program component being to increase the safety, availability and maintainability of Defence assets. Three specific examples are provided of the smart materials and structures program, ranging across the spectrum of technology readiness from new concept phase to technology transitioning, viz.: (i) Advances in smart sensing for prognostics-based platform management; (ii) Fabrication of nanostructured and ultrafine grained materials through top-down severe plastic deformation processing of bulk materials; (iii) Innovative application of carbon nanotubes/conducting polymers as artificial muscles for low-power propulsion and control of small autonomous underwater systems. In each case, the DSTO effort is underpinned by strong university or industry linkages to deliver challenging interdisciplinary S&T.


2021 ◽  
Vol 6 (2) ◽  
pp. 401-426
Author(s):  
Paola Andrea Castiblanco ◽  
José Luis Ramirez ◽  
Astrid Rubiano

The use of soft robotics and smart materials for the design of devices that help the population in different tasks has gained a rising interest. Medicine is one of the fields where its implementation has shown significant advances. However, there are works related to applications, directed to the human body especially in replacement of devices for the upper limb. This document aims to explore the state of the art relating to the study of soft robotics, the implementation of smart materials, and the artificial muscles in the design or construction of hand prostheses or robotic devices analogous to the human hand.


Author(s):  
Henriette Grellmann ◽  
Felix Lohse ◽  
Vikram Kamble ◽  
Hans Winger ◽  
Andreas Nocke ◽  
...  

Abstract Natural muscles, that convert chemical energy derived from glucose into mechanical and thermal energy, are capable of performing complex movements. This natural muscle power was the only way to perform mechanical work in a targeted manner for millions of years. In the course of thousands of years of technical development, mankind has succeeded in harnessing various physical and chemical phenomena to drive specific mechanical processes. Wind and water power, steam and combustion engines or electric motors are just a few examples. However, in order to make the diversity and flexibility of natural motion patterns usable for machines, attempts have been made for many years to develop artificial muscles. These man-made smart materials are able to react to environmental conditions by significantly changing their shape or size. For the design of effective artificial muscles that closely resemble the natural original, the usage of textile technology offers great advantages. By means of weaving, individual actuators can be parallelized, which enables the transmission of greater forces. By knitting the maximum stretching performance can be enhanced by combining the intrinsic stretching capacity of the actuators with the structural-geometric stretching capacity of the fabric. Furthermore textile production techniques are well suited for the requirement-specific, individual placement of actuators in order to achieve the optimal geometry for the respective needs in every load case. Ongoing technical development has created fiber based and non-fibrous artificial muscles that are capable of mimicking and even out-performing their biological prodigy. Meanwhile, a large number of partly similar, but also very different functional principles and configurations were developed, each with its own specific characteristics. This paper provides an overview of the relevant and most promising technical approaches for realising artificial muscles, classifies them to specific material types and explains the mechanisms used as well as the possible textile applications.


Soft Matter ◽  
2015 ◽  
Vol 11 (19) ◽  
pp. 3833-3843 ◽  
Author(s):  
Soodabeh Sharafi ◽  
Guoqiang Li

Artificial muscles are emerging materials in the field of smart materials with applications in aerospace, robotic, and biomedical industries.


2021 ◽  
Vol 8 ◽  
Author(s):  
Yuneng Tang ◽  
Baiqian Dai ◽  
Bin Su ◽  
Yusheng Shi

Soft tactile sensors (STSs) combine the flexibility and the converting ability between mechanical forces and electrical signals. 4D printing was first introduced in 2013, and attracted great interest because of its versatile functionalities in actuators, artificial muscles, STSs, soft energy harvesting, pneumatic nets, electroactive polymers, and soft electronics. Using the 4D printing concept to fabricate STSs is promising, yet it is at its infant stage. At present, researchers have utilized two types of strategies: one is directly using smart materials through 3D printing manufacturing, and the other is programming codes of components and structures to create controllable changes. This review summarizes the recent research on 4D printing toward STSs and discusses the future perspectives of this emerging field.


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