A Bioinspired Soft Robotic Gripper for Adaptable and Effective Grasping

Abstract

The present article shows the development of a gripper for general purposes with grasping and holding capabilities enabled by a simple control scheme. This objective has been reached exploiting the combination of soft materials, underactuated mechanisms, and a bioinspired design. The development of the soft gripper will be explained by reporting the results obtained on three different and sequential versions. The devices are here presented in their main components, underlining the anthropomorphic approach used in the design of the fingers. The used actuation mechanism is based on the control of a single cable tension, which guarantees a grasping adaptable to objects of different shape. Manipulation capability and grasping force have been tested, in order to extract a quantitative comparative analysis between the three proposed devices. The main factor that influences the improvement of the gripper performance results to be represented by the suitable combination of material with the right mechanical properties. Outcomes show how the use of a bioinspired design together with the intrinsic mechanical properties of soft materials can give rise to new soft devices able to show dexterous grasping capabilities with a simple control and actuation system.