The Soft Robotics Toolkit (SRT) is an open-access website containing detailed information about the design, fabrication, and characterization of soft-robotic components and systems (Figure 1). Soft robotics is a growing field of research concerned with the development of electromechanical technology composed of compliant materials or structures. The SRT website hosts design files, multimedia fabrication instructions, and software tutorials submitted by an international community of soft-robotics researchers and designers. In this article, we describe the development of the SRT and some challenges in developing widely disseminated robotic-hardware resources. Our attempts to overcome these challenges in the development of the toolkit are discussed by focusing on strategies that have been used to engage participants ranging from K-12 grade students to robotics research groups. A series of design competitions encouraged people to use and contribute to the toolkit. New fabrication methods requiring only low-cost and accessible materials were developed to lower the entry barriers to soft robotics and instructional materials and outreach activities were used to engage new audiences. We hope that our experiences in developing and scaling the toolkit may serve as guidance for other open robotic-hardware projects.

Modulation of surface stresses is a recent and promising method to perform mesoscale manipulation of components in liquid medium. We present a promising approach using infra red laser-induced thermocapillary-driven flow for handling multiple or single large and heavy objects. The objects are immersed in thin liquid layers and in contact with the substrate surface. These objects can be handled with high speed thermocapillary convection flow reaching significant forces depending on the object sizes. Velocity measurements showed that 92 µm-sized spherical beads can be dragged with velocities of about 5.5 mm/s. Parallel non-contact micromanipulation can be achieved.