Cyber Valley Research Fund drives advancements in soft robotics

Dr. Ardian Jusufi and his team researched innovative materials that improve proprioception (the body’s ability to sense movement and position) in unpredictable and irregular environments. Insights from the project have deepened understanding of how the body moves and interacts with its environment. These advancements in soft active materials and sensors will revolutionize the fields of biomedical devices and soft robotics.  

Some of the project’s key achievements include:  

• Enhanced pumping system performance: The project team improved a hydrogel-encapsulated soft actuator pumping system. The system demonstrated improved competitive pressure and fluid velocity performance, offering potential insights for cardiovascular and renal applications. 

• Addressing sensor challenges: The project addressed the inherent trade-offs of soft sensors. While offering greater flexibility and sensitivity, these sensors often lack robustness, repeatability, linearity, and durability. Various use cases were evaluated to balance these trade-offs effectively. 

• Innovative manufacturing and materials: The team developed advanced manufacturing techniques and synthesized new materials responsive to environmental stimuli, such as hydrodynamic pressure. This was relevant for studying locomotion, like the undulatory swimming of fish, using fluidic actuators. 

• System integration with mobile soft actuators: Soft sensors were integrated with mobile soft fluidic actuators in robots. This integration provided valuable insights into the neuromechanics of movement, particularly in aquatic environments. 

• Electroactive polymer-driven pumping systems: The team aimed to reduce the tissue stress associated with traditional implanted pumps. Although current limitations related to in-body electricity use means that these systems are not yet feasible for in vivo applications, the research marks significant progress in understanding the biomechanics of movement. 

This project yielded the following publications:  

1. Souri H, Banerjee H, Jusufi A, Radacsi N, Stokes A, Park I, Sitti M, Amjadi M. Advanced Int. Sys. 2 (8) 2000039. Wearable and Stretchable Strain Sensors: Materials, Sensing Mechanisms, and Applications. 2020. Advanced Intelligent Systems, Volume: 2, Issue: 8, 2020. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1002/aisy.202000039 
2. Banerjee H, Kalairaj MS, Ren H, and Jusufi A*. Advanced Engineering Materials. Strong, Ultrastretchable Hydrogel-Based Multilayered Soft Actuator Composites Enhancing Biologically Inspired Pumping Systems. [Cover inside] Adv. Eng. Mater 2021, 23, 2100121. 
3. Wright B, Vogt D, Wood R, Jusufi A*. IEEE International Conference on Soft Robotics (RoboSoft). Soft Sensors for Curvature Estimation under Water in a Soft Robotic Fish. COEX, Seoul, Korea, 2019.
4. Siddall R, Fukushima T, Bardhi D, Perteshoni B, Morina A, Hasimja E, Dujaka Y, Haziri G, Martin L, Banerjee H, Jusufi A*. Advanced Robotics 35 (7). Compliance, Mass Distribution and Contact Forces in Cursorial and Scansorial Locomotion with Biorobotic Physical Models. 2021. https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/01691864.2021.1887760.
5. Fukushima Toshihiko, Robert Siddall,Fabian Schwab, Severine Toussaint, Greg Byrnes, John Nyakatura, and Ardian Jusufi. Inertial tail effects during righting of squirrels in unexpected falls: From behavior to robotics. Integrative and Comparative Biology, icab 023, 2021.
6. Lin Yu-Hsiang, Siddall R, Schwab F, Fukushima T, Banerjee H, Youngjoon Baek, Daniel Vogt, Yong-Lae Park, and Jusufi A. Modeling and control of a soft robotic fish with integrated soft sensing. Advanced Intelligent Systems, 2000244, 2021.
7. Fabian Schwab, Elias T Lunsford, Taehwa Hong, Fabian Wiesemüller, Kovac M, Park YL, Akanyeti O, Liao J C, and Jusufi A. Body caudal undulation measured by soft sensors and emulated by soft artificial muscles. Integrative and Comparative Biology, 2021.
8. Fabian Schwab, Fabian Wiesemüller, Claudio Mucignat, Yong-Lae Park, Ivan Lunati,Mirko Kovac, and Ardian Jusufi. Undulatory swimming performance explored with a biorobotic fish and measured by soft sensors and particle image velocimetry. Frontiers in Robotics and AI, page 387, 2021.
9. Robert Siddall, Greg Byrnes, Rob J. Full and Ardian Jusufi, Tails stabilize landing of gliding geckos crashing head-first into tree trunks', Communications Biology, 2021. 

This research project primarily aimed to expand knowledge of biomechanics through robophysical models, rather than immediate practical applications. It started in April 2020 and concluded in February 2023. Dr. Ardian Jusufi was formerly a Max Planck Research Group Leader at the MPI for Intelligent Systems (March 2018–January 2024). He is now Head of Soft Kinetic group in the Engineering Sciences Department of the Empa Swiss Federal Labs for Materials Science and Technology.