ENGINEERS DEVELOP SMART TEXTILE WHICH ACTS LIKE BIOLOGICAL MUSCLE

Fri 19 August 2022:

A team of Australian biomedical engineers has created a smart textile with artificial’muscles’ in the hopes that it would revolutionize the future of soft robotics and wearable exoskeletons.

The scientists used models of a butterfly and flower fashioned out of the textile that performed intricate motions in their lab to show how easily the material could change shape.

Thanh Nho Do, the team’s head, has greater ideas and thinks his group might even be able to use the material to make a human smart suit.

Do, who also serves as the director of the University of New South Wales Medical Robotics Lab, stated, “Like the Iron Man suit or Spiderman costume.” It has a great degree of conformability to the body and is quite flexible.

The artificial muscle fibres were woven or knitted into the cloth to generate the programmable smart textiles. According to the team’s scholarly research, which was published in June, the resulting substance can lift things up to 192 times their weight and can change shape. According to the study, the “muscle fibres” were made from lengthy silicon tubes that had been filled with fluid and were then bent hydraulically using a syringe.

Compression clothing could be one application. The team displayed prototypes that pulsed over a finger and forearm and might deliver massage therapy to reduce discomfort or enhance blood flow.

The development of shape-shifting robots to aid search and rescue teams in reaching remote areas is another potential application, according to the bioengineers.

The team is also working on creating a non-invasive device that can wrap around the heart and assist it to pump blood around the body, to help people with cardiovascular problems, thanks to funding from the National Heart Foundation of Australia.

SOURCE: INDEPENDENT PRESS AND NEWS AGENCIES

___________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

FOLLOW INDEPENDENT PRESS:

TWITTER (CLICK HERE)
https://twitter.com/IpIndependent