Study on Tetherless Micro-Soft Robot Based on Magnetic Elastic Composite Material

Abstract

Tetherless micro-robotic devices have recently shown great capabilities for remote applications in medical procedures, in microfluidic tools and in micro-factories. Smart magnetic flexible materials are promising candidates to address these challenges since they can be Untethered driven by magnetic field for multiple functionalities. Here, we proposed a new micro-soft robot based on magnetic elastic composite material through high precise 3D printer. The micro-soft robot can realize two kinds of motion modes: rolling motion and crawling motion. The magnetic field is generated by 3D Helmholtz coil, and each motion is controlled by different applied magnetic field. Based on the simplified model of Euler-Bernoulli beam theory, the model of the bending angle of micro-robots is established, and the validity of the model is verified by experiments. Finally, we discuss and analyse the influence of rolling and crawling motion velocity with difference control strategy, including waveforms, amplitudes and frequencies of input signal. The experimental results show that: The rolling motion velocity of the micro-robot is linearly related to the frequency of the rotating magnetic field. The crawling motion velocity of the micro-soft robot is positively correlated both with the amplitude and frequency. In addition, the robot crawls faster in the sine waveform than triangular waveform of input signal.