Yukun Ren

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About

Yukun Ren is a pioneering researcher in the emerging field of liquid metal-based soft robotics and microfluidics. His work centers on harnessing the unique properties of gallium-based liquid metals—such as their high surface tension, electrical conductivity, and fluidic adaptability—to create novel actuators, motors, and droplet manipulation systems. Ren’s major contributions include the invention of a tripodal wheeled mobile robot driven by a liquid metal motor (17 citations), which demonstrated a silent, gearless, and infinitely variable-speed actuation concept. He also developed an electrocapillarity-induced “hurricane-in-a-tube” technique for high-throughput generation and patterning of liquid metal droplets (8 citations), addressing a critical challenge in soft robotics and biomedical device fabrication. Additionally, Ren achieved the transfer of liquid metal droplet motion from an alkaline solution to air using a robotic arm (8 citations), expanding the practical applicability of these materials beyond liquid environments. His work is notable for bridging fundamental electrokinetic phenomena with real-world robotic locomotion, earning recognition for its creativity and potential to transform soft actuator design. Ren’s research continues to push the boundaries of what liquid metals can achieve in autonomous systems.