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Flexible manipulator inspired by octopi: advantages of the pulling mechanism

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Abstract

In this study, we focus on flexible manipulators made of silicone. In conventional works, various flexible manipulators have been proposed. Usually, these manipulators are driven by air pressure. By expanding some parts of a finger, pushing force is generated to bend the finger. In contrast, most real creatures use a pulling force to move their bodies. In our previous works, we developed a flexible manipulator using pulling mechanism that generate octopus-like behavior. However, advantages of the pulling mechanism were not demonstrated enough. In this paper, to confirm the advantages of the proposed pulling mechanism, we develop two manipulators of the same size: one uses the conventional pushing mechanism, and the other uses the proposed pulling mechanism. The goal of this study is to explore the advantages of the developed manipulator with the pulling mechanism by comparing it to the conventional manipulator with the pushing mechanism. Experiments are conducted to compare their adaptive behaviors.

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Acknowledgements

This research was partially supported by the Japan Society for the Promotion of Science through the Grant-in-Aid for Scientific Research (18K11445, 15KK0015).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Hosei University, Tokyo, Japan

    Kazuyuki Ito & Taichi Mukai

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  1. Kazuyuki Ito
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  2. Taichi Mukai
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Correspondence to Kazuyuki Ito.

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Ito, K., Mukai, T. Flexible manipulator inspired by octopi: advantages of the pulling mechanism. Artif Life Robotics 25, 167–172 (2020). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10015-019-00573-7

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10015-019-00573-7

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