U Of C Researchers Create Unique Robotic Arm That Grabs Without Fingers
By Samantha Abernethy in News on Feb 24, 2012 6:20PM
Researchers at the University of Chicago and Cornell University have created a robotic arm that uses a different approach to grabbing and throwing objects. Instead of a hand, it uses a "jammer" with "a balloon-like gripper filled with granular material." With a vacuum behind it, it can pick up objects, then reverse pressure and throw them.
The gripper passively conforms to the shape of a target object, then vacuum hardens to grip it rigidly, later utilizing positive pressure to reverse this transition -- releasing the object and returning to a deformable state ... By using both positive and negative pressure, we demonstrate performance increases of up to 85% in reliability, 25% in error tolerance, and the added capability to shoot objects by fast ejection.
Watch the video below to see how it works.