A robot manus that has the lightness of interaction to clasp delicate objects and the spot to crush cans could 1 time beryllium utilized arsenic a prosthetic
Technology 14 December 2021By Carissa Wong
A highly dexterous, human-like robotic manus with fingertip interaction sensors tin delicately clasp eggs, usage tweezers to prime up machine chips and crush portion cans. The manus could yet beryllium utilized arsenic a prosthetic oregon successful robots that usage artificial quality to manipulate objects.
Weighing 1.1 kilograms, the manus is 22 centimetres agelong and made of alloy and aluminium. Each digit is driven by 3 tiny motors that acceptable wrong the thenar and determination metallic parts that enactment similar tendons astir a full of 20 joints. This enables the digits to tilt sideways, to flex backmost and distant and to fold, giving the manus a scope of movements comparable to that of a quality hand.
Uikyum Kim astatine Ajou University successful South Korea and his colleagues, who built the hand, accidental it tin clasp an ovum without cracking it, determination drinks and crush aluminium cans.
The researchers besides tested whether the robotic manus could usage tools. They recovered it can: it could beryllium programmed to clasp a brace of scissors and chopped paper, and besides to manipulate tweezers to prime up and spot a microchip connected a circuit board.
The robot manus successful action Kim et al.
“Can I truly manipulate the tweezers connected my desk? I was curious. I retrieve being precise satisfied with the infinitesimal that [it worked],” says Kim.
Compared with existing robotic hands, the basal of the manus tin much easy connect to commercialized robotic arms.
“The top spot of the developed robotic manus is that it is precise casual to connect to existing commercialized robot arms portion having some beardown grip and delicacy,” says Kim.
He and his colleagues besides tested the durability of the robotic manus by programming a digit to propulsion down onto a sensor perpetually for 30 minutes. They recovered that the unit applied by the digit hardly weakened during this time.
Next, they utilized the manus to prime up dumbbells weighing 18 kilograms, which it could bash without breaking. In different test, they programmed 1 of the robot fingers to crook and flex repeatedly to property a sensor each 2nd for 11 minutes. It did truthful passim that clip without slowing oregon losing force.
In future, the manus could signifier portion of intelligent robots susceptible of sensing and manipulating objects, portion a lighter mentation of the manus could beryllium utilized arsenic a prosthetic.
However, this prototype presently lacks softness compared with a quality hand, truthful the squad hopes to make a flexible artificial skin, says Kim.
Journal reference: Nature Communications, DOI: 10.1038/s41467-021-27261-0
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