机构:[1]Department of Diagnostic Ultrasound, Beijing Tongren Hospital, Capital Medical University, Beijing 100730, China.首都医科大学附属北京同仁医院医技科室超声诊断科[2]Department of Mechanical Engineering, The University of Tokyo, Tokyo 113-8656, Japan.[3]Department of Materials Science and Engineering, College of Design and Engineering, National University of Singapore, Singapore 117583, Singapore.[4]NO. 1 Outpatient Department of Xi Cheng District, Beijing Garrison, Beijing 100055, China.[5]School of Mechanical Engineering and Automation, Beihang University, Beijing 100191, China.[6]Beijing Advanced Innovation Center for Biomedical Engineering, Beihang University, Beijing 100083, China.
Soft-bodied robots driven by external fields have better environmental adaptability, extending their applications. Nature also provides lots of inspiration for shape-morphing robot development, for example, larvae and jellyfish. This paper presents magnetically propelled hydrogel-based millirobots with volume changeability. The millirobot can be imaged in real time in a completely enclosed space with an ultrasound imaging system. Firstly, a custom-designed magnetic generating system with six square coils was introduced to generate a uniform field to propel the robot. The robot was fabricated using hydrogel with a thickness of around 300 μm. After programmable magnetization, the robot could change its shape and move using the rotating magnetic field. With the near-infrared illumination, the robot could shrink and could recover when the illumination stopped. Even when the robot shrank, it could be propelled by the external field, showing its potential usage in complex environments. Moreover, the posture information of the robot including the position and shape could be obtained in real time using ultrasound image technology.
基金:
National Key R&D Program of China (Grant No.
2019YFB1309700), the Beijing Nova Program of Science and Technology (Grand No. Z191100001119003),
and the Beijing Hospitals Authority Clinical Medicine Development of Special Funding Support
(Grant No. ZYLX202104).