Issue 10, 2022

A tripodal wheeled mobile robot driven by a liquid metal motor

Abstract

As a novel driving concept, the liquid metal motor (LMM) has been regarded as a promising actuator due to its unique traits, such as infinitely variable speed, lack of transmission chain, convenient maintenance, and silence. However, at present, driving devices based on this material are still in the preliminary and rudimentary stage, and representative application examples are scarce. Therefore, an 8-shaped tripodal wheeled mobile robot (WMR) completely driven by a LMM is designed in this study to further prove the practicability of this material. Through combining the Marangoni surface flow on a liquid metal droplet (LMD) caused by an electrochemical reaction and the eccentric torque generated by the change in droplet shape and position, the two independently driven wheels of the mobile robot are actuated at differential moving speeds. Additionally, a matching control module, a cell phone application, and a battery have been developed and added for wireless control of three types of driving functions (moving forward, steering, and stopping). It is expected that this work could further advance the development and application of LMMs and bring new ideas to the design of WMRs.

Graphical abstract: A tripodal wheeled mobile robot driven by a liquid metal motor

Supplementary files

Article information

Article type
Paper
Submitted
23 mar 2022
Accepted
22 apr 2022
First published
25 apr 2022

Lab Chip, 2022,22, 1943-1950

A tripodal wheeled mobile robot driven by a liquid metal motor

R. Xue, W. Guo, Y. Tao and Y. Ren, Lab Chip, 2022, 22, 1943 DOI: 10.1039/D2LC00267A

To request permission to reproduce material from this article, please go to the Copyright Clearance Center request page.

If you are an author contributing to an RSC publication, you do not need to request permission provided correct acknowledgement is given.

If you are the author of this article, you do not need to request permission to reproduce figures and diagrams provided correct acknowledgement is given. If you want to reproduce the whole article in a third-party publication (excluding your thesis/dissertation for which permission is not required) please go to the Copyright Clearance Center request page.

Read more about how to correctly acknowledge RSC content.

Social activity

Spotlight

Advertisements