Soft Robots
During my dissertation I explored the concepts, fabrication, operation and impact of pneumatic soft robot actuators, aiming to enable researchers, makers and others to create and investigate costumised soft robot systems. For this, we worked on different projects, from toolkit development to qualitaitve and quantitative user studies. Underneath you will find the information for each of those projects, including the links to the ressources needed for the projects (https://git.rwth-aachen.de/i10/public/softrobots).
Design & Fabrication of Soft Robots
SoRoCAD: A Design Tool for Building Pneumatic Soft Robots
LBW at ACM CHI '23: ACM Digital Libary Link
Abstract
Soft robotics uses soft, flexible materials and elastic actuation mechanisms to create systems that are more adaptable and tolerant to unknown environments, and safer for human-machine interaction, than rigid robots.
Pneumatic soft robots can be fabricated using more affordable materials compared to traditional robots and make use of technologies such as 3D printing, making them an attractive choice for research and DIY projects.
However, their design is still highly unintuitive, and at up to two days, design iterations can take prohibitively long: The behavior of, e.g., a pneumatic silicone gripper only becomes apparent after designing and 3D printing its mold, casting, curing, assembling, and testing it.
We introduce SoRoCAD, a design tool supporting a Maker-friendly soft robotics design and fabrication pipeline that incorporates simulating the final actuation into the design process.
SoRoCAD is a GitLab project. If you would like to get access to the GitLab, please look on the Git project website. For any questions contact me under:
How Users Understand Soft Robots
Understanding how SoRoCAD impacts a users mental model.
Abstract
Novices are increasingly coming into contact with educational robotics (ER) in their education, and using soft robots in ER is an attractive option for educating them in various STEM disciplines. However, integrating soft robots into their school curricula requires us first to understand how they engage with and work on this topic, as well as their mental models of it. In two user studies, one with adult beginners and one with teenagers, we found that \emph{SoRoCAD} supports rapid prototyping and iterative testing for both user groups. However, we also found that the way SoRoCAD allows users to design soft robots also limits their perception of the look of a soft robot and its possible applications. Still, for teenagers using SoRoCAD as an educational robotics toolkit, it was able to shift their mental models of soft robot physics. Also, it fostered their engagement and problem-solving when approaching a design task.
Results and other files are available on the Git project website.
Operating Soft Robots Using Embedded Programming
Flowboard: Seamless and live visual IDE for programming embedded components using flow-based programming
Demo at ACM CHI'19: ACM Digital Libary Link
Article in ACM ToCHI '23: ACM Digital Libary Link
Abstract
Enabling hardware to become interactive requires programming of embedded components like microcontrollers that act as the system’s brain. Understanding electronics and embedded coding is essential for users to control soft robot motion and actuation. Toolkits like the Arduino system have established embedded programming for beginners and in STEM education. However, learning embedded programming remains challenging, as it requires an understanding of both electronics and coding, as well as their interaction. This inspired us to develop Flowboard, a tool that helps users get started with embedded programming using a flow-based embedded visual IDE that leverages seamless and live interactions. With Flowboard, users can test and create interactive circuits to control the motion of soft robot actuators with simple components, such as a pump. User studies revealed how Flowboard’s setup helps users to develop a mental model of electronic components and their programming.
Design files and fabrication instruction are available on the Flowboard project website.
Soft Robot Shapes and User Associations
Understand what users associate with the motion of 3D-animated soft robots.
LBW at ACM CHI'23: ACM Digital Libary Link
Abstract
Physical objects have an impact on the user. The movements performed by soft robots also affect their environment, i.e., humans. The motions of soft robots, as well as their materials, are factors that influence how humans perceive them. However, the variety of soft robot shape designs and how to integrate them into applications has not been explored fully yet. In the first step, we examined participants’ associations and ideas regarding potential application areas for 36 soft robot shapes presented as 3D virtual objects. With this work, we explored how users perceive the movements of soft robots and the applications they envision. We aim to contribute to the discourse on integrating soft robots into HCI to enable novel and engaging user experiences with technology.
Results and other files are available on the Git project website.
Conveying Emotions through Soft Robot Motion
Understanding how motion parameters such as amplitude of real soft robots can convey emotions to observers and wearers.
Abstract
Building on the findings with the virtual 3D objects about the potential of shape movement, we investigated its effects in physical objects, focusing on emotional communication. Our goal was to understand how individual parameters of shape change influence conveyed emotions, which aspects of the observed emotions they affect, and what their movement might communicate. To investigate this, we varied the conditions so that participants either observed the movement visually or felt it directly on the skin of their neck. We found that motion type, speed, repetition, and amplitude can each be isolated as factors that deliberately convey an emotional state. Furthermore, we present a script that we implemented to fabricate soft robots with precise motions for studying the impact of various motion characteristics, such as speed, frequency etc.
OpenSCAD script, other design files and user study results are available on the project website.
Team
- Anke Brocker, Research assistant
- Prof. Dr. Jan Borchers
Publications
- Philip Le. SoRoCAD 3.0: A Cross-Platform Approach to Soft Robotics Design. Bachelor's Thesis, RWTH Aachen University, Aachen, May 2024.
- Anke Brocker, Ekaterina Nedorubkova, Simon Voelker and Jan Borchers. Exploring Shape Designs for Soft Robotics and Users’ Associations with Them. In Extended Abstracts of the 2023 CHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems, CHI EA '23, pages 7, Association for Computing Machinery, New York, NY, USA, April 2023.
- Ali Shtarbanov, Anke Brocker, Adriana Cabrera, Yuhan Hu, Heiko Müller and Alex Mazursky. Soft Robotics and Programmable Materials for Human-Computer Interaction. In Companion Publication of the 2023 ACM Designing Interactive Systems Conference, DIS '23 Companion, pages 110–113, Association for Computing Machinery, New York, NY, USA, 2023.
- Anke Brocker, Jakob Strüver, Simon Voelker and Jan Borchers. SoRoCAD: A Design Tool for the Building Blocks of Pneumatic Soft Robotics. In CHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems Extended Abstracts, CHI EA '22, pages 7, Association for Computing Machinery, New York, NY, USA, April 2022.
- Anke Brocker, Jose A. Barreiros, Ali Shtarbanov, Kristian Gohlke, Ozgun Kilic Afsar and Sören Schröder. Actuated Materials and Soft Robotics Strategies for Human-Computer Interaction Design. In CHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems Extended Abstracts, CHI EA '22, pages 7, Association for Computing Machinery, New York, NY, USA, April 2022.
- Sören Schröder. Conveying Emotions through Movements and Materials of Soft Robots in the Context of Smart Jewelry. Master's Thesis, RWTH Aachen University, Aachen, January 2022.
- Sarah Sahabi. SoRoCAD 2.0: Extending a CAD Tool for Soft Robotics. Bachelor's Thesis, RWTH Aachen University, Aachen, April 2021.
- Jakob Strüver. Evaluating SoRoCAD: Enabling Users to Design Custom Soft Robotics. Master's Thesis, RWTH Aachen University, Aachen, October 2020.
- Patrick Bayer. SoRoLib: Library of Building Blocks for Pneumatic Shape Changing in Soft Robotics. Master's Thesis, RWTH Aachen University, Aachen, September 2019.