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Robotic fabrics
In today’s world, robotics has become part and parcel of one’s everyday life. One of the more ambitious and innovative branches of robotics is the branch of “soft robotics.” This involves flexible and more motile robot bodies rather than rigid ones. A practical operation of the soft robotics branch is the recently discovered “robotic fabrics” innovation.
A robotic fabric is essentially a fabric that includes applications like actuation, sensing, and variable stiffness while retaining all the qualities that make the material so useful - flexibility, breathability, small storage footprint, and low weight. The actuation components are designed so that they do not affect the weight and volume of the fabric.
Until recently, robotic fabrics were attached to external machines that modulate factors inside them, such as shape, sensors, or air pressure. Now, the emergence of fibers that can sense and alter structurally means that engineers can impart automatic functions into textiles — and open up a world of possibilities. One such innovation is the concept of breathable garments.
Breathable garments are new types of fabrics that could help athletes and performers train their breathing and could be developed further to help hospital patients. MIT researchers have created clothing that senses how much it is being stretched/compressed and provides immediate tactile feedback through pressure, stretch, or vibration. They contain a fluid channel in the center, which gets activated as the system pressurizes and releases compressed air/water into the drain, allowing the textile to act as an artificial muscle.
Researchers envision that it could help train singers or athletes to control their breathing better and even help patients recover from respiratory diseases like COVID-19.
A multidisciplinary group from Wyss Institute for biologically inspired engineering (Harvard) has developed Smart Thermally Actuating Textiles (STATs) — soft textile robots that could enable new therapies for injury rehabilitation. They induce electrical liquid-vapor phase change as a response to disturbance. They can prevent injuries from happening in the first place by applying forces at specific frequencies, for example, preventing pressure sores in bedridden / wheelchair-using people.
Researchers at Yale University have been working on the uses of robotic fabrics in space travel, for instance, compression garments. They have developed a specific type of material that includes properties like actuation, sensing, and variable stiffness, while at the same time retaining all the generic properties of a soft fabric like flexibility, breathability, compactness, and low weight.
This research has been funded by the Air Force Office of Science Research. Demonstrations have shown that the design can turn itself from a flat fabric into a standing, load-bearing structure and even a small airplane.
In conclusion, robotic fabrics are an inevitable and integral part of the near future and are bound to become a day-to-day entity in every household.