Design and Control of a Multi-jointed Robot Finger Driven by an Artificial Muscle Actuator

In this paper, we present a robotic actuation system using an artificial muscle actuator based on a dielectric elastomer. A novel linear actuator called a ‘multi-stacked actuator’ is proposed that can be embedded in the phalanges of a multi-jointed robot finger. This actuator ensures a compact design of the overall system. As an example, a 2-d.o.f. robot finger is developed and its performance under the proposed actuator system is experimentally demonstrated. The application of the proposed system can be extended easily to a multifingered robot hand and even to articulated mechanisms such as legged robots, etc. © Koninklijke Brill NV, Leiden and The Robotics Society of Japan, 2010