Challenges and Opportunities of Electrically-Driven Soft Actuators

Electrically-driven soft actuators

**  DEAs  **  HASELs  **  Materials & manufacturing  **  Design & modeling  **  Robot integration  **  Commercial applications  **

Electrically-driven soft actuators (EDSAs) are power-dense, high-efficiency, and high-bandwidth soft actuators that can be a direct bridge between common electronic circuitry and soft robots. While existing EDSAs have demonstrated muscle-like capabilities that could be well-suited for a variety of robotic applications, including bio-inspired robots, wearable robots, and medical robots, challenges persist in practically implementing these EDSAs for real-world exploration. Specifically, EDSAs generally require high voltage and bulky electronics to operate, their labor-intensive manufacturing process results in low production throughput, and their operation lifetime is too short for practical use. Breakthroughs in materials selection and synthesis, automated fabrication, design and modeling, and robotic system integration would be critical for advancing EDSA technology.

This workshop gathers experts around the world across disciplines to share their recent advances in EDSAs. The workshop presentations will cover key topics of EDSAs: innovative materials, actuator design and scalable manufacturing processes, and integration into robotic systems for real-world applications. We will include poster presentations, lightning talks, demonstration sessions, and a discussion panel to foster an interactive environment for participation. We hope that this workshop will yield breakthroughs in soft actuator technology, promote collaborative research projects, and define ‘best practices’ with this class of actuators.