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A gravity offload rig for testing lunar rovers that can simulate the gravitational conditions on the Moon here on Earth has taken top honors at the Spring 2022 Capstone Design Showcase at Colorado School of Mines.
Applied Physics Lab researchers develop advanced soft robots
The team s flexible, snail-like robot is untethered from a power source and controlled remotely, opening new possibilities for the burgeoning technology By Amanda Zrebiec / Published Jan 22, 2021
The pink strip lies flat on a black-and-white checkerboard surface. It s rubbery gummy, almost and just thicker than an unrolled fruit leather snack. At a glance, the strip seems unremarkable.
Introduce heat, however, and the strip transforms. Arching and extending, it wriggles like an inchworm, contorting itself independently. Remove the thermal stimulus, and the strip returns to its original form.
It seems like magic, or at least a trick of the imagination, but it s really just chemistry. What looks like a rubber strip is a piece of phase-changing material made of liquid crystal elastomers, or LCEs. The material, which becomes an artificial muscle of sorts, is programmed to rep