Dielectric Elastomer Fiber Actuators with Aqueous Electrode.

Keita Shimizu,Jun Shintake,Toshiaki Nagai

doi:10.3390/polym13244310

Keita Shimizu, Jun Shintake + Show 1 more

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https://doi.org/10.3390/polym13244310

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Journal: Polymers	Publication Date: Dec 9, 2021
Citations: 10	License type: CC BY 4.0

Affiliation: University of Electro-Communications

Abstract

Dielectric elastomer actuators (DEAs) are one of the promising actuation technologies for soft robotics. This study proposes a fiber-shaped DEA, namely dielectric elastomer fiber actuators (DEFAs). The actuator consisted of a silicone tube filled with the aqueous electrode (sodium chloride solution). Furthermore, it could generate linear and bending actuation in a water environment, which acts as the ground side electrode. Linear-type DEFA and bending-type DEFA were fabricated and characterized to prove the concept. A mixture of Ecoflex 00–30 (Smooth-On) and Sylgard 184 (Dow Corning) was employed in these actuators for the tube part, which was 75.0-mm long with outer and inner diameters of 6.0 mm and 5.0 mm, respectively. An analytical model was constructed to design and predict the behavior of the devices. In the experiments, the linear-type DEFA exhibited an actuation strain and force of 1.3% and 42.4 mN, respectively, at 10 kV (~20 V/µm) with a response time of 0.2 s. The bending-type DEFA exhibited an actuation angle of 8.1° at 10 kV (~20 V/µm). Subsequently, a jellyfish-type robot was developed and tested, which showed the swimming speed of 3.1 mm/s at 10 kV and the driving frequency of 4 Hz. The results obtained in this study show the successful implementation of the actuator concept and demonstrate its applicability for soft robotics.

Highlights

University of Electro-Communications, 1-5-1 Chofu-gaoka, Chofu 182-8585, Tokyo, Japan; Abstract: Dielectric elastomer actuators (DEAs) are one of the promising actuation technologies for soft robotics
This study proposes dielectric elastomer fiber actuators (DEFAs)
The experimental data showed a quadratic increase that can be expressed based on the Maxwell stress, ε 0 ε r (V/d)2 —a fundamental principle commonly used in DEAs

Summary

Introduction

University of Electro-Communications, 1-5-1 Chofu-gaoka, Chofu 182-8585, Tokyo, Japan; Abstract: Dielectric elastomer actuators (DEAs) are one of the promising actuation technologies for soft robotics. This study proposes a fiber-shaped DEA, namely dielectric elastomer fiber actuators (DEFAs). The actuator consisted of a silicone tube filled with the aqueous electrode (sodium chloride solution). It could generate linear and bending actuation in a water environment, which acts as the ground side electrode. The linear-type DEFA exhibited an actuation strain and force of 1.3% and 42.4 mN, respectively, at 10 kV (~20 V/μm) with a response time of 0.2 s. Dielectric elastomer actuators (DEAs) are one of the promising actuation technologies in soft robotics [4,5,6,7]. The structural simplicity of DEAs provides fast response speed (e.g., actuation at 600 Hz [8]), high electro-mechanical efficiency (theoretically up to 90% [9]), and large actuation strains (e.g., an area strain of more than 1000% [10])

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Results

Conclusion