Synthetic Material Soft Robots Grow Like Plants
There are robotic banana fingers and then this innovative process for synthetic material that lets soft robots grow like plants. This breakthrough will help build better soft robots capable of navigating hard-to-reach places, complicated terrain, and potentially areas within the human body.



The field of soft robotics deal with robots that are made of soft, pliable materials as opposed to rigid ones. These growing robots can generate new material and “grow” as they move, making them perfect for use in remote areas where humans can’t go, like inspecting or installing tubes underground or navigating inside the human body for biomedical applications. University of Minnesota engineers solved this problem of hard to maneuver solid filament by developing a new means of extrusion by allowing the robot to create its synthetic material from a liquid instead of a solid.

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A very important part of this project is that we have material scientists, chemical engineers, and robotic engineers all involved. By putting all of our different expertise together, we really brought something unique to this project, and I’m confident that not one of us could have done this alone. This is a great example of how collaboration enables scientists to address really hard fundamental problems while also having a technological impact,” said Chris Ellison, a lead author of the paper.

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