Special Issue "Pneumatic Muscle Actuators"

A special issue of Actuators (ISSN 2076-0825).

Deadline for manuscript submissions: 15 February 2022.

Special Issue Editors

Dr. Francesco Durante
E-Mail Website
Guest Editor
Department of Industrial and Information Engineering and Economics, University of L’Aquila, Via G. Gronchi 18, 67100 L’Aquila, Italy
Interests: bioengineering; service robotics; man-amplifying exoskeletons; pneumatic muscle actuators; shape memory alloy actuators; microsystems
Special Issues and Collections in MDPI journals
Dr. Pierluigi Beomonte Zobel
E-Mail Website
Guest Editor
Department of Industrial and Information Engineering and Economics, University of L’Aquila, Via G. Gronchi 18, 67100 L’Aquila, Italy
Interests: robotics (mobile and fixed robots, grippers); fluid power (pneumatic systems and components, pneumatic controls); bioengineering (exoskeleton, orthoses, and pneumatic muscles)
Special Issues and Collections in MDPI journals
Dr. Michele Gabrio Antonelli
E-Mail Website
Guest Editor
Department of Industrial and Information Engineering and Economics, University of L’Aquila, Via G. Gronchi 18, 67100 L’Aquila, Italy
Interests: mechatronics; soft and pneumatic muscle actuators; service robotics; agricultural robotics; bioengineering
Special Issues and Collections in MDPI journals

Special Issue Information

Dear Colleagues,

Pneumatic muscle actuators were initially conceived only for bioengineering applications. Over time, several new types have also been proposed for industrial applications, keeping some interesting characteristics unchanged: high strength/mass ratio, possibility of realization with easily available materials, ease of realization, low cost, ease of introduction into mechanical devices thanks to high tolerances assembly, respect for the environment and compliance, very useful for devices that must interact with humans.

The behavior of pneumatic muscles is strongly nonlinear due to large deformations and nonlinear characteristics of the materials they are made of. For this reason, it is difficult to predict their behavior, and many of the efforts of researchers in the past have been directed toward modeling in order to obtain tools for the sizing, prediction of functioning, life duration, and control of pneumatic muscles.

The recent development of soft actuators has led to a renewed interest of researchers in pneumatic muscles.

This Special Issue aims to collect all the most innovative contributions on the theme of pneumatic muscles and soft actuators on topics including, but not limited to, new types of actuators, new realization technologies, new realization materials, new applications, and new models for sizing, control, for the forecast of operation, and for fatigue life duration.

You may choose our Joint Special Issue in Machines.

Dr. Francesco Durante
Dr. Pierluigi Beomonte Zobel
Dr. Michele Gabrio Antonelli
Guest Editors

Manuscript Submission Information

Manuscripts should be submitted online at www.mdpi.com by registering and logging in to this website. Once you are registered, click here to go to the submission form. Manuscripts can be submitted until the deadline. All papers will be peer-reviewed. Accepted papers will be published continuously in the journal (as soon as accepted) and will be listed together on the special issue website. Research articles, review articles as well as short communications are invited. For planned papers, a title and short abstract (about 100 words) can be sent to the Editorial Office for announcement on this website.

Submitted manuscripts should not have been published previously, nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere (except conference proceedings papers). All manuscripts are thoroughly refereed through a single-blind peer-review process. A guide for authors and other relevant information for submission of manuscripts is available on the Instructions for Authors page. Actuators is an international peer-reviewed open access monthly journal published by MDPI.

Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 1600 CHF (Swiss Francs). Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.

Keywords

  • pneumatic muscles
  • soft actuators
  • rubber actuators 
  • compliance 
  • pneumatic control 
  • nonlinear behavior 
  • modeling

Published Papers (1 paper)

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Research

Article
Numerical and Experimental Study of a Flexible Trailing Edge Driving by Pneumatic Muscle Actuators
Actuators 2021, 10(7), 142; https://doi.org/10.3390/act10070142 - 24 Jun 2021
Viewed by 374
Abstract
A static aeroelastic analysis of the flexible trailing edge is conducted to calculate the deformed shape, aerodynamic coefficients and corresponding driving pressure. A physical flexible trailing edge model is manufactured using a honeycomb structure, which is measured based on binocular vision. The quadratic [...] Read more.
A static aeroelastic analysis of the flexible trailing edge is conducted to calculate the deformed shape, aerodynamic coefficients and corresponding driving pressure. A physical flexible trailing edge model is manufactured using a honeycomb structure, which is measured based on binocular vision. The quadratic response surface method is adopted to establish the pneumatic artificial muscle actuator model. The wire-pulley transmission model is built to identify the existence of equivalent forces and produce the equivalent forces as the substitute of actuation force. A finite element model of the flexible trailing edge is established, which is validated by the test data. A nonlinear relationship is found between the driving pressure and deflection angle. The pressure needed to bear the structural stiffness is found to be much larger than that of the aerodynamic load. With the increase in pressure, the magnitude of the lift coefficient increases less. However, the magnitude of the drag coefficient increases more with the increase in pressure under 0.2 MPa. When the driving pressure exceeds 0.2 MPa, the relationship between them is nearly linear. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Pneumatic Muscle Actuators)
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