Abstract
Artificial muscles, made of soft and compliant materials, are one the main components of soft robots. In any case, and independent from the type and design of such actuators, the choice of material and fabrication process plays a critical role for their performance. Dielectric Elastomer Actuators (DEAs), also known as a subset of artificial muscles, are made of thin elastomer layers embedded between two layers of soft electrodes. In the journey of finding a suitable elastomer material with relatively low elastic modulus, high relative permittivity, and high dielectric breakdown strength, we found the ECOFLEXTM00–10 mixed with SILICONE THINNER™ as a promising candidate. In this paper, first we investigate into the mechanical and electrical properties of this silicone-based elastomer. Then, we explain the fabrication method of these soft actuators. Finally, after describing how the implementation of rigid poly(methyl methacrylate) (PMMA) structure makes the actuator bend, we present a bending actuator.
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Acknowledgement
Funded by the Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (German Research Foundation) under Germany’s Excellence Strategy – EXC-2193/1 – 390951807.
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Jamali, A., Knoerlein, R., Goldschmidtboeing, F., Woias, P. (2022). Development and Characterization of a Soft Bending Actuator. In: Hunt, A., et al. Biomimetic and Biohybrid Systems. Living Machines 2022. Lecture Notes in Computer Science(), vol 13548. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-20470-8_16
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-20470-8_16
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