Integrative actuators and sensors inside a single energetic device offer compelling capabilities for developing robotics, prosthetic limbs, and minimally invasive surgical tools. But instrumenting these devices on the microscale is constrained by current manufacturing technologies.
Now, a team of researchers has developed a versatile polymer-based actuatable fiber which is able to being integrated with smart materials and biosensing composite materials. The technology may result in technological advancements in soft and versatile robotic fields, which could open possibilities for achieving closed-loop control for high-precision operations.
Details of their research were published in ACS Applied Engineering Materials on January 23, 2023.
Dr. Yuanyuan Guo, who’s an associate professor at Tohoku University’s Frontier Research Institute for Interdisciplinary Sciences (FRIS), led the team.
Our microscale fiber, integrated with actuating and sensing functions, could enable the usage of smart catheters.”
Dr. Yuanyuan Guo, Associate Professor, Tohoku University’s Frontier Research Institute for Interdisciplinary Sciences
The team produced the fiber by applying the preform-to-fiber thermal drawing process. The telecommunication industry has employed thermal drawing to supply optical fibers and, more recently, to fabricate multi-material and multifunctional fibers for biomedical applications. Although many vital functions, corresponding to electrodes, optics, and channels, might be incorporated inside fibers, they’re limited to passive modalities.
To deliver a workaround to this limitation, the team embedded shape-memory alloy (SMA) wires. The form-memory effect of the SMA’s enabled fibers with high mechanical actuation.
Moreover, they integrated the fiber with carbon-based composite materials to enable biochemical sensing. The sensors were able to intrinsically high sensitivity towards electroactive molecules.
Utilizing a bifurcated vessel model, the team also succeeded in using the actuatable fiber sensor to approach branched vessels and capture localized chemical information for diagnostic purposes.
Looking ahead, Guo and her team hope to enhance the fiber’s freedom of movement.
Source:
Journal reference:
Sato, Y & Guo, Y., (2023) Shape-Memory-Alloys Enabled Actuatable Fiber Sensors via the Preform-to-Fiber Fabrication. ACS Applied Engineering Materials. doi.org/10.1021/acsaenm.2c00226.