Constructed from delicate, flexible and lifelike materials, soft robots have the potential to improve on their heavy and awkward, metal-bodied robots. Now a new generation of soft robots is growing and self-repairing its way to meeting researchers’ high expectations.
Shepherd and his team designed a soft robot that not only heals damage but doesn’t need to be told when to do so. Using fiber-optic (光纤) sensors, the robot can detect when its material has been punctured. Then it uses a hyperelastic (超弹性的) material to quickly heal the wound. The robot is also programmed to move in a new direction after damage. Later work could expand these repairs to bigger missing parts and holes.
Another team created a soft robot that “grows” like a plant or fungus. But to grow, soft robots typically have to drag material behind them and use it to 3-D-print new structures. This can hinder (妨碍) a robot’s work like dragging around a garden hose (软管) would for a person, says study co-author Chris Ellison, a University of Minnesota engineer and materials scientist.
Building soft robots that can work, heal and grow independently could change many areas of human life. Swift robots could fit into factory settings more easily if they had humanlike hands that could use the same tools we do, notes ETH Zurich roboticist Robert Katzschmann, who was not involved in the above studies.
Soft robots could also find a place in hospitals. Working alongside nurses and doctors, a robot could help softly and safely hold organs in place during surgery. “Helping hands could make medicine a bit less costly,” Katzschmann says.
“I think soft robots are an avenue to endurance and flexibility not seen before in artificial machines,” Shepherd says. “With heightened sensing and motion skills, strong compositions, and newfound independence, these soft machines’ future looks solid.”
【小题1】What does the underlined word “punctured” in paragraph 2 probably mean?| A．Made a hole. | B．Made a mistake. |
| C．Caused by a sharp object. | D．Designed and produced. |
| A．They can walk freely like people. |
| B．They are self-repairing and more flexible. |
| C．They can operate on patients independently. |
| D．They use humanlike hands to repair machines. |
| A．Supportive. | B．Skeptical. | C．Indifferent. | D．Neutral. |
| A．Old Robots Have Many Disadvantages | B．Soft Robots Are Changing Human Life |
| C．New-style Robots Are Around the Corner | D．Soft Robots Take Steps toward Independence |
