Thermally Tunable, Self‐Healing Composites for Soft Robotic Applications

Abstract

The field of soft robotics has inspired recent mechanical engineering and materials science innovations to enable shape‐shifting systems to be developed. This paper presents the design and analysis of a novel thermally tunable composite, namely, a flexible open‐cell foam coated in wax that can achieve significant ranges of stiffness, strength, and volume. Experimental results were compared to a proposed model for predicting the bulk compression modulus of the composites. Additionally, preliminary studies indicate that the composites exhibit self‐healing properties, in which heating between loading cycles can mend wax that has been plastically deformed, for example, by cracking or delaminating from the foam.