The Ni Lab at Duke's Mechanical and Materials Engineering Department focuses on human-machine interaction by leveraging the fabrication of soft-robotic systems. These soft robots and interactive fabrications assist in connecting humans with the digital realm more ubiquitously than prevailing systems.
I have been involved in the fabrication and development of soft-polymer shape sensors and apparatus for testing the developed prototypes.
Shape Sensor Fabrication
I was trained under Dr. Sooik Im, a postdoc specialising in fabrication of soft stretchable substrates with channels of liquid matter, scientifically known as eutectic gallium indium or EGaIn. Under him, I received guidance on fabricating a shape sensor - a soft substrate that possesses conductive grids that don't break or disrupt conduction on stretching. It was important to lace the nodes with Bulk EGaIn which has a linear correlation between resistance and deformation. This factor is leveraged to determine the extents of deformation that in accordance with computer simulations determine the shape of the object.
These are fundamental building blocks of creating responsive soft robots that bridge the human-machine interaction challenges we face in today's world.
Other Prototyping Projects
The interconnected nature of the lab encouraged me to partake in several projects. I assisted in the development of the moulds of the soft substrates of the shape sensors. I even developed moulds that were the pneumatically actuated soft shape morphing segments of our study.
Furthermore, the actuation itself required the development of a linear actuator - which was designed and developed using 3D Printing and Fabrication Techniques.
The specifics deserved a post of their own. Click here to read more.
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