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About

Brandon Tighe is a leading figure in soft robotics, whose work is fundamentally reshaping how robots move, adapt, and interact with their environments. His research centers on creating morphologically adaptive and reconfigurable robots, with a key focus on developing novel actuation and shape-morphing schemes. Tighe’s major contributions include pioneering the use of twisted-and-coiled actuators (TCAs) as low-cost artificial muscles for centimeter-scale soft robots, enabling programmable motions with free strokes—a concept detailed in his highly cited 2020 work (95 citations). He has also introduced an embedded shape-morphing approach that integrates actuation and sensing directly into a robot’s body, eliminating the need for bulky external equipment (82 citations). His innovative use of origami-inspired modules has led to reconfigurable robots capable of multimodal locomotion and programmable shapes (31 citations). Furthermore, Tighe has addressed a critical limitation of soft robots—slow speeds and small forces—by tuning their energy landscapes to achieve fast, powerful motion (22 citations). Through these achievements, Tighe is not just building better robots; he is establishing the foundational principles for a new generation of machines that are as adaptable as they are capable.