Pneumatically Operated Tendril-based Soft Hyper-Redundant Robotic Gripper

Abstract The present work aims to design a soft, hyper redundant robotic gripper inspired by natural tendrils. The development of automation also requires extensive study in the field of biomimetic robotics. Most robotic systems are generally built using traditional rigid materials, such as hard plastics and metals. Creating accurate robotic systems necessitates the assembly of firm components connected at specific joints. Nonetheless, crafting a robotic system modeled after natural systems, comprising continuous deformable materials, is anticipated to match or exceed the capabilities of rigid robotic systems. Soft and highly redundant robotic grippers offer nearly limitless degrees of freedom (DOF) and elevated levels of kinematic redundancy. In the present work, a soft robotic gripper is proposed, inspired by plant tendrils that deform helically to hold the object on actuation. The work describes the initial design, material selection, method, important design parameters, an actuation mechanism and the simulation and analysis of the soft gripper. Such studies will be useful to industries and researchers in automation and biomimetic robotic systems.