Inchworms use their morphology and evolved behaviors to crawl and climb various complex surfaces. This has inspired the development of different robots that can demonstrate similar capabilities for various applications such as the inspection of a complex environment. One of the key challenges in designing these robots is to enable them to be practically deployable with a compact design for providing continuous adaptability to a complex terrain such as an outer-pipe surface. Taking this into consideration, we present a new design for an inchworm-inspired crawling robot (iCrawl). The 5 DOF robot relies on two legs; each with an electromagnetic foot, in order to crawl on the metal pipe surfaces. The robot uses a passive foot-cap underneath an electromagnetic foot, enabling it to be a versatile pipe-crawler. The foot-cap design is an abstraction of the leg posture in an inchworm adapting to a round surface. The proposed foot-caps give the robot adaptability and stability for crawling on metal pipes of various curvatures. A state-machine based controller was developed to produce the required motor signals for the two inchworm-inspired crawling gaits: i) the step gait, and ii) the sliding gait. Both gaits were tested on the robot, eventually leading to it effectively crawling on the pipes and flat surfaces, climbing a metal wall and a pipe, and succeeding in obstacle avoidance during crawling. Experimental results also show that the robot has the ability to crawl on the metal pipes of various curvatures using the foot-caps and an appropriate gait. The robot can be used as a new robotic solution to assist close inspection outside the pipelines, thus minimizing downtime in the oil and gas industry.

Monarch butterflies’ remarkable migratory abilities, facilitated by their efficient wing structures, inspire the development of bioinspired soft robots and microaerial vehicles. This study presents the design, fabrication, and wing‐morphing behavior of 3D‐printed magnetic butterflies, focusing on optimal material and design parameters to replicate monarch wing‐morphing behavior. Using composite of thermoplastic polyurethane and micron‐sized Nd₂Fe₁₄B magnetic powder, 12 unique butterfly designs—varying in size, vein patterns, and stiffness—are fabricated via powder bed fusion (PBF) 3D printing, resulting in 84 specimens. Lightweight and batch‐producible with minimal postprocessing, the specimens have weights per unit area of ≈270, 480, and 1045 g m⁻² for small, medium, and large sizes, respectively. A permanent magnet induces deformation in the specimens—mimicking monarch butterflies, without embedded electronics. A systematic analysis combining finite element simulations and experiments reveals the effects of size, geometric features, and laser energy scale on wing morphing. Lower laser energy scales result in porous, fast‐bending specimens, while higher scales specimen show greater mechanical strength and varied deformation, with vein structures further improving deformation. The results provide a detailed dataset for optimizing wing‐morphing designs while highlighting the potential of the PBF process in creating lightweight magnetic bioinspired structures capable of optimal shape morphing.

Soft robots, particularly magnetic soft robots, require specialized simulation tools to accurately model their deformation under external magnetic fields. However, existing platforms often lack dedicated support for magnetic materials, making them difficult to use for researchers at different expertise levels. This work introduces an open-source, user-friendly simulation interface using the Simulation Open Framework Architecture (SOFA), specifically designed to model magnetic soft robots. The tool enables users to define material properties, apply magnetic fields, and observe resulting deformations in real time. By integrating intuitive controls and stress analysis capabilities, it aims to bridge the gap between theoretical modeling and practical design. Four benchmark models -- a beam, three- and four-finger grippers, and a butterfly -- demonstrate its functionality. The software's ease of use makes it accessible to both beginners and advanced researchers. Future improvements will refine accuracy through experimental validation and comparison with industry-standard finite element solvers, ensuring realistic and predictive simulations of magnetic soft robots.

We present the design and overall development of an eight degrees of freedom (DOF) based Bioinspired Quadruped Robot (BiQR). The robot is designed with a skeleton made of cedar wood. The wooden skeleton is based on exploring the potential of cedar wood to be a choice for legged robots’ design. With a total weight of 1.19 kg, the robot uses eight servo motors that run the position control. Relying on the inverse kinematics, the control design enables the robot to perform the walk gait-based locomotion in a controlled environment. The robot has two main aspects: 1) the initial wooden skeleton development of the robot showing it to be an acceptable choice for robot design, 2) the robot’s applicability as a low-cost legged platform to test the locomotion in a laboratory or a classroom setting.

Functional magnetic composites capable of large deformation, load bearing, and multifunctional motion are important for next-generation adaptive soft robots. Here, we present muscle-inspired magnetic actuators additively manufactured by laser powder bed fusion (LPBF) from a thermoplastic polyurethane/Nd–Fe–B (TPU/MQP-S) composite. By tuning the laser-energy scale from 1.0 to 3.0, the mechanical stiffness and magnetic response of the printed composite are adjusted, increasing the tensile strength from 0.28 to 0.99 MPa while maintaining 30%–45% elongation at break. This processing strategy enables the fabrication of 0.5 mm-thick flexural hinges that undergo reversible bending and folding under moderate magnetic fields without structural damage. Two actuator architectures demonstrate the versatility of the platform. The elongated actuator, with a self-weight of 1.57 g and magnetized in its contracted state, produces linear contraction under a 500 mT magnetic field, lifts 50 g (32× its own weight), and maintains performance over at least 1000 cycles. When integrated with anisotropic frictional feet, it enables a magnetic crawling robot that achieves up to 100% locomotion success on textured substrates. The expandable actuator exhibits reversible opening and closing under a 300 mT field, enabling reliable grasping and release of different objects, including soft berries and rigid 3D printed geometries, and can anchor inside a tube while supporting suspended loads of 50 g. This work establishes an LPBF-based route to program stiffness and magnetization within a single material system, enabling remotely actuated, reconfigurable, and fatigue-resistant soft robotic components. The presented approach broadens the design space for multifunctional magnetic soft robots capable of gripping, locomotion, and anchoring in confined or adaptive environments.