Robots that can sense touch and heal themselves are becoming a reality
Robots that can sense touch and heal themselves are becoming a reality
Release time：2018-04-14
Views：6888
Human skin is difficult to replicate because it is not only flexible, tactile, and self-healing. However, scientists' latest discoveries are giving robot skin these properties.
Do you think only the skin of living things is flexible, resistant to pressure, tactile, and self-healing? Recent research results show that robot skin can also perform better than human skin.
Researchers at the University of Glasgow in the UK used graphene to develop an electronic robot skin that is more sensitive to touch than human hands.
According to foreign media reports, Ravinder Dahiya, a professor at the University of Glasgow, said that the newly developed robot skin is essentially a tactile sensor, and scientists will use it to create lighter prosthetics and robots with softer and more natural surface skin.
And this sensor is also the first step towards softer robots and more sensitive touch screen sensors.
This low-power intelligent robot skin is made of a single atomic layer of graphene. The skin has a power of 20 nanowatts per square centimeter, which is equivalent to the lowest quality photovoltaic cell currently available. Although the energy generated by the skin's photovoltaic cells cannot be stored yet, the engineering team is exploring ways to transfer unused energy into the battery so that it can be used when needed.
Graphene is the thinnest, strongest, and most conductive and thermally conductive new nanomaterial discovered so far. Due to its good strength, flexibility, conductivity and other properties, it has broad application potential in physics, materials science, electronic information and other fields.
In terms of optical properties, research data shows that the vertical absorption rate of single-layer graphene for visible light and near-infrared light is only 2.3%.
"How to get sunlight to penetrate the skin covered with photovoltaic cells is our real challenge." Ravinder told Advanced Functional Materials.
"No matter what kind of light, 98% can reach the solar cell." Dahiya explained to the BBC that the electricity generated by the solar cell is used to produce touch. "Its sense of touch is an order of magnitude better than human skin."
The skin gives the robot arm the proper pressure feedback, allowing it to better control the force of grasping objects, even fragile eggs can be picked up and put down steadily.
Dahiya said: "The next step is to develop the power generation technology that supports this research and use it to drive the motor of the prosthetic hand, which can allow us to create a completely energy-autonomous prosthesis."
In addition, this superior robot skin is not expensive. Dahiya said that 5-10 square centimeters of new skin only costs $1. In fact, graphene can do much more than give the robot arm a keen sense of touch. It can also help the robot skin heal itself.
According to futurism, Indian scientists published the latest research in the journal
Open Physics, which found that graphene has a strong self-healing function. Scientists hope to apply this feature to the field of sensors so that robots can have the same skin self-healing function as humans. Traditional metal robot skins have poor ductility and are prone to cracks and breakage. However, if sub-nanometer sensors made of graphene can sense cracks, then the robot skin can prevent the cracks from expanding further or even repair them. Research data shows that when the cracks exceed the critical displacement threshold, the automatic repair function will automatically start.
"We hope to observe the self-healing behavior of original and defective monolayer graphene through molecular dynamics simulations, and also observe the performance of graphene in the process of sub-nanometer sensor crack positioning." In an interview, Swati Ghosh Acharyya, the main author of the paper, said: "At room temperature and without any external stimulation, we can observe the self-healing behavior of graphene."
Researchers from India said that this technology will be put into use quickly, perhaps as the next generation of robots.
Do you think only the skin of living things is flexible, resistant to pressure, tactile, and self-healing? Recent research results show that robot skin can also perform better than human skin.
Researchers at the University of Glasgow in the UK used graphene to develop an electronic robot skin that is more sensitive to touch than human hands.
According to foreign media reports, Ravinder Dahiya, a professor at the University of Glasgow, said that the newly developed robot skin is essentially a tactile sensor, and scientists will use it to create lighter prosthetics and robots with softer and more natural surface skin.
And this sensor is also the first step towards softer robots and more sensitive touch screen sensors.
This low-power intelligent robot skin is made of a single atomic layer of graphene. The skin has a power of 20 nanowatts per square centimeter, which is equivalent to the lowest quality photovoltaic cell currently available. Although the energy generated by the skin's photovoltaic cells cannot be stored yet, the engineering team is exploring ways to transfer unused energy into the battery so that it can be used when needed.
Graphene is the thinnest, strongest, and most conductive and thermally conductive new nanomaterial discovered so far. Due to its good strength, flexibility, conductivity and other properties, it has broad application potential in physics, materials science, electronic information and other fields.
In terms of optical properties, research data shows that the vertical absorption rate of single-layer graphene for visible light and near-infrared light is only 2.3%.
"How to get sunlight to penetrate the skin covered with photovoltaic cells is our real challenge." Ravinder told Advanced Functional Materials.
"No matter what kind of light, 98% can reach the solar cell." Dahiya explained to the BBC that the electricity generated by the solar cell is used to produce touch. "Its sense of touch is an order of magnitude better than human skin."
The skin gives the robot arm the proper pressure feedback, allowing it to better control the force of grasping objects, even fragile eggs can be picked up and put down steadily.
Dahiya said: "The next step is to develop the power generation technology that supports this research and use it to drive the motor of the prosthetic hand, which can allow us to create a completely energy-autonomous prosthesis."
In addition, this superior robot skin is not expensive. Dahiya said that 5-10 square centimeters of new skin only costs $1. In fact, graphene can do much more than give the robot arm a keen sense of touch. It can also help the robot skin heal itself.
According to futurism, Indian scientists published the latest research in the journal
Open Physics, which found that graphene has a strong self-healing function. Scientists hope to apply this feature to the field of sensors so that robots can have the same skin self-healing function as humans. Traditional metal robot skins have poor ductility and are prone to cracks and breakage. However, if sub-nanometer sensors made of graphene can sense cracks, then the robot skin can prevent the cracks from expanding further or even repair them. Research data shows that when the cracks exceed the critical displacement threshold, the automatic repair function will automatically start.
"We hope to observe the self-healing behavior of original and defective monolayer graphene through molecular dynamics simulations, and also observe the performance of graphene in the process of sub-nanometer sensor crack positioning." In an interview, Swati Ghosh Acharyya, the main author of the paper, said: "At room temperature and without any external stimulation, we can observe the self-healing behavior of graphene."
Researchers from India said that this technology will be put into use quickly, perhaps as the next generation of robots.
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