The prospects of endowing artificial robotics or devices with increasingly complex and emergent life‐like behaviors have attracted growing interest in the soft functional materials that mimic the versatile motions of living creatures in the iridescent nature. However, despite the flourishing achievements so far, soft actuators capable of sensitive multi‐stimulus responses and self‐sustainable movements, have been extensively pursued to reduce control complexity yet remains a challenging target. Here, through material‐structural synergistic design incorporating stress‐mismatching structure, high pseudo‐negative coefficient of thermal expansion of perfluoro‐sulfonic acid ionomer, comprehensive converting properties of carbon nanotube, and anisotropic large thermal expansion of PE polymer, an ionomer‐based bilayer actuator is proposed, presenting high‐performance actuation of various forms and nice stability, responsive to light (including sunlight without focusing, LED light), low voltage, mild heating, and humidity/solvent change. With a built‐in structural feedback loop, the actuation performances are further explored to realize intelligent systems, including: 1) self‐sustainable locomotion under sunlight irradiation with adjustable photophobic and phototropic direction as well as adaption to different topographies and loading conditions, 2) self‐sustainable oscillation and solar‐electric generating, and 3) bionic floristic reaction according to environmental change. These diversified actuation modes allow promising following‐up designs for bio‐hybrid soft robotics fueled by and harmonized with natural environments.

In this work, we proposed an inflatable particle-jamming gripper based on a novel grasping strategy of integrating the positive pressure and partial filling, in which the positive pressure increases the contact area between the gripper and objects, and the grain package in a partial-filled state provides significant grasping adaptation for the gripper. First, we design and fabricate the inflatable particle-jamming gripper and clarify its working mechanism. Then three kinds of grippers, including the proposed inflatable gripper, full-filled gripper, and partial-filled gripper, are experimentally compared for the capability of grasping objects of various sizes, and their performances from four metrics (compliance, reliability, grasping robustness, and lifting efficiency) are evaluated as well. Furthermore, a theoretical analysis is carried out for different grasping performances among the three kinds of grippers, in which the inflatable gripper performs a more promising grasping performance. In this article, by inflating the gripper to an ordered extent with positive pressure, the originally full-filled gripper turns into a partial-filled state. Based on the unique grasping strategy of the proposed gripper, it is possible to achieve a brilliant compliance and robust grasps. Even though the object is located 20 mm away from the gripper-center-axis, valid grasps are observed as well. It is concluded that the proposed gripper could potentially have a wide range of applications in the industry and daily activities.

In this paper, a novel fabrication process of stacked dielectric elastomer actuator (SDEA) is developed based on casting process and elastomeric electrode. The so-fabricated SDEA benefits the advantages of homogenous and reproducible properties as well as little performance degradation after one-year use. A coupling model of SDEA is established by taking into consideration of the elastomeric electrode and the calculated results agree with the experiments. Based on the model, we attain the method to optimize the SDEA’s parameters. Finally, the SDEA is used as an isolator in active vibration isolation system to verify the feasibility in dynamic application. And the experiment results show a great prospect for SDEA in such application.

The emerging demand for bio-inspired soft robotics requires novel soft actuators whose performance exceeds conventional rigid ones. Dielectric elastomer actuators (DEAs) are a promising soft actuation technology with large actuation strain and fast response. Cone DEAs are one of the most widely adopted DEA configurations for their compact structure and large force/stroke output with several configuration variations developed in recent years. By driving at a resonant frequency, the cone DEAs show a significant amplification in their power outputs, which demonstrates their suitability for highly dynamic robotic applications. However, it is still unclear how the payload conditions could affect the power outputs of cone DEAs and no work has compared the output performance of different variations of cone configurations. In this work, by considering conical configuration DEAs with generalized dissipative payloads, we conduct an extensive study on the effects of payload conditions on the power outputs of the cone DEA family. Additionally, we benchmark the performance of different cone DEA configurations and illustrate the fundamental principles behind these output patterns. The findings reported in this work establish guidelines for designing high-performance cone DEA actuators.