Bistable and multistable actuators for soft robots: Structures, materials, and functionalities

Y Chi, Y Li, Y Zhao, Y Hong, Y Tang… - Advanced Materials, 2022 - Wiley Online Library
Snap‐through bistability is often observed in nature (eg, fast snapping to closure of Venus
flytrap) and the life (eg, bottle caps and hair clippers). Recently, harnessing bistability and …

Colloidal self-assembly approaches to smart nanostructured materials

Z Li, Q Fan, Y Yin - Chemical reviews, 2021 - ACS Publications
Colloidal self-assembly refers to a solution-processed assembly of nanometer-/micrometer-
sized, well-dispersed particles into secondary structures, whose collective properties are …

Caterpillar-inspired soft crawling robot with distributed programmable thermal actuation

S Wu, Y Hong, Y Zhao, J Yin, Y Zhu - Science Advances, 2023 - science.org
Many inspirations for soft robotics are from the natural world, such as octopuses, snakes,
and caterpillars. Here, we report a caterpillar-inspired, energy-efficient crawling robot with …

Twisting for soft intelligent autonomous robot in unstructured environments

Y Zhao, Y Chi, Y Hong, Y Li… - Proceedings of the …, 2022 - National Acad Sciences
Soft robots that can harvest energy from environmental resources for autonomous
locomotion is highly desired; however, few are capable of adaptive navigation without …

3D‐Printed Photoresponsive Liquid Crystal Elastomer Composites for Free‐Form Actuation

Y Wang, R Yin, L Jin, M Liu, Y Gao… - Advanced Functional …, 2023 - Wiley Online Library
Direct ink writing of liquid crystal elastomers (LCEs) offers a new opportunity to program
geometries for a wide variety of shape transformation modes toward applications such as …

Photocontrollable Elongation Actuation of Liquid Crystal Elastomer Films with Well‐Defined Crease Structures

Y Huang, Y Xu, HK Bisoyi, Z Liu, J Wang… - Advanced …, 2023 - Wiley Online Library
Although liquid crystal elastomers (LCEs) have demonstrated various applications in
artificial muscles and soft robotics, their inherent flexibility and orientation‐dependent forces …

4D printing of reprogrammable liquid crystal elastomers with synergistic photochromism and photoactuation

M Chen, Y Hou, R An, HJ Qi, K Zhou - Advanced Materials, 2024 - Wiley Online Library
Abstract 4D printing of liquid crystal elastomers (LCEs) via direct ink writing has opened up
great opportunities to create stimuli‐responsive actuations for applications such as soft …

Physically intelligent autonomous soft robotic maze escaper

Y Zhao, Y Hong, Y Li, F Qi, H Qing, H Su, J Yin - Science Advances, 2023 - science.org
Autonomous maze navigation is appealing yet challenging in soft robotics for exploring
priori unknown unstructured environments, as it often requires human-like brain that …

Multi-functional liquid crystal elastomer composites

Y Wang, J Liu, S Yang - Applied Physics Reviews, 2022 - pubs.aip.org
Liquid crystal elastomers (LCEs), owing to their intrinsic anisotropic property and capability
of generating programmable complex morphologies under heat, have been widely used for …

Bioinspired light-fueled water-walking soft robots based on liquid crystal network actuators with polymerizable miniaturized gold nanorods

X Yang, Y Chen, X Zhang, P Xue, P Lv, Y Yang… - Nano Today, 2022 - Elsevier
Walking on water is a unique locomotion mode found in aquatic living creatures. However, it
remains challenging to create light-driven aquatic soft robots that can walk freely on water …