PT  - JOURNAL ARTICLE
AU  - Rafsanjani, Ahmad
AU  - Zhang, Yuerou
AU  - Liu, Bangyuan
AU  - Rubinstein, Shmuel M.
AU  - Bertoldi, Katia
TI  - Kirigami skins make a simple soft actuator crawl
AID  - 10.1126/scirobotics.aar7555
DP  - 2018 Feb 21
TA  - Science Robotics
PG  - eaar7555
VI  - 3
IP  - 15
4099  - http://robotics.sciencemag.org/content/3/15/eaar7555.short
4100  - http://robotics.sciencemag.org/content/3/15/eaar7555.full
SO  - Sci. Robotics2018 Feb 21; 3
AB  - Bioinspired soft machines made of highly deformable materials are enabling a variety of innovative applications, yet their locomotion typically requires several actuators that are independently activated. We harnessed kirigami principles to significantly enhance the crawling capability of a soft actuator. We designed highly stretchable kirigami surfaces in which mechanical instabilities induce a transformation from flat sheets to 3D-textured surfaces akin to the scaled skin of snakes. First, we showed that this transformation was accompanied by a dramatic change in the frictional properties of the surfaces. Then, we demonstrated that, when wrapped around an extending soft actuator, the buckling-induced directional frictional properties of these surfaces enabled the system to efficiently crawl.