A team of researchers from North Carolina State University has beaten its own record for the fastest swimming soft robot, drawing inspiration from manta rays to improve their ability to control the
A team of researchers from North Carolina State University has beaten its own record for the fastest swimming soft robot, drawing inspiration from manta rays to improve their ability to control the robot’s movement in the water.
“Two years ago, we demonstrated an aquatic soft robot that was able to reach average speeds of 3.74 body lengths per second,” says Jie Yin, corresponding author of a paper on the work. “We have improved on that design. Our new soft robot is more energy efficient and reaches a speed of 6.8 body lengths per second. In addition, the previous model could only swim on the surface of the water. Our new robot is capable of swimming up and down throughout the water column.”
The soft robot has fins shaped like those of a manta ray, and is made of a material that is stable when the fins are spread wide. The fins are attached to a flexible, silicone body that contains a chamber that can be pumped full of air. Inflating the air chamber forces the fins to bend – similar to the down stroke when a manta flaps its fins. When the air is let out of the chamber, the
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