TY - JOUR
T1 - Arc-heating actuated active-morphing insect robots
AU - Che, Jingyu
AU - Yang, Xiangyu
AU - Peng, Jinzhe
AU - Li, Jingyi
AU - Liu, Zhiwei
AU - Qi, Mingjing
N1 - Publisher Copyright:
© The Author(s) 2025.
PY - 2025/12
Y1 - 2025/12
N2 - In nature, insects can swiftly move and actively morph to adapt to complex and varied conditions. However, replicating this capability in insect-scale robots requires sophisticated structural designs, which are difficult to achieve at such a small scale without fundamental hardware innovations. This work proposes a coupling mechanism between actuation and morphing by combining an arc-heating actuator and shape memory alloy wires, presenting a fast insect-scale robot (83.4 body lengths per second) capable of active morphing and self-recovery. The arc-heating actuator is designed to provide the kinetic energy and the thermal energy essential for deforming the wires. The robot can compress its body thickness to traverse through a gap of 70% its height smoothly within 2.2 seconds and is amphibious. Furthermore, after enduring pressure 5 million times its weight, the robot is flattened, but fully recovers its original size and performance in just a few seconds.
AB - In nature, insects can swiftly move and actively morph to adapt to complex and varied conditions. However, replicating this capability in insect-scale robots requires sophisticated structural designs, which are difficult to achieve at such a small scale without fundamental hardware innovations. This work proposes a coupling mechanism between actuation and morphing by combining an arc-heating actuator and shape memory alloy wires, presenting a fast insect-scale robot (83.4 body lengths per second) capable of active morphing and self-recovery. The arc-heating actuator is designed to provide the kinetic energy and the thermal energy essential for deforming the wires. The robot can compress its body thickness to traverse through a gap of 70% its height smoothly within 2.2 seconds and is amphibious. Furthermore, after enduring pressure 5 million times its weight, the robot is flattened, but fully recovers its original size and performance in just a few seconds.
UR - https://www.scopus.com/pages/publications/105001158877
U2 - 10.1038/s41467-025-58258-8
DO - 10.1038/s41467-025-58258-8
M3 - 文章
C2 - 40148351
AN - SCOPUS:105001158877
SN - 2041-1723
VL - 16
JO - Nature Communications
JF - Nature Communications
IS - 1
M1 - 3014
ER -