Design of a new electroactive polymer based continuum actuator for endoscopic surgical robots

Abstract

This paper presents a smart continuum actuator based on a promising class of materials: ElectroActive polymer (EAP). Indeed these polymers undergo dimensional change in response to an applied electrical field and could be integrated directly in an endoscopic robot structure. We focuses on one of such materials, an electrostrictive polymer, for its valuable strain performances. An analytical model leading to the development of an experimental analysis of such a material in an attempts to overcome the technical gap of their integration into a multilayer composite sheet to perform robotic actuation is the subject of this article.