Bio-Inspired Actuation for Embodied Intelligence in Robotics
A Special Issue of Actuators (ISSN 2076-0825) belonging to the section "Actuators for Robotics".
Deadline for manuscript submissions: 30 January 2027 | Viewed by 155
Editors
Interests: actuators; soft robotics; biologically inspired robotics; manufacturing; circular economy
Special Issues, Collections and Topics in MDPI journals
Special Issue Information
Dear Colleagues,
Advances in robotics are increasingly driven by the tight coupling between a system’s physical form and its control. Inspired by biological systems, new actuation strategies are enabling robots to achieve adaptive, efficient, and robust behaviors through their embodied design. This Special Issue seeks to highlight cutting-edge research at the intersection of bio-inspired actuation and embodied intelligence, with a particular emphasis on how actuator design, materials, and integration contribute to intelligent function.
We invite the submission of original research articles and reviews that explore how bio-inspired actuation can enable or enhance embodied intelligence in robotic systems, spanning scales from micro to macro and applications from healthcare to manufacturing and beyond. Contributions may address theoretical, experimental, or application-focused work, and interdisciplinary perspectives are especially encouraged.
Submissions may include, but are not limited to, the following:
- Bio-inspired actuator design (e.g., muscle-like, tendon-driven, plant-inspired systems);
- Soft actuators and compliant mechanisms;
- Smart and active materials for actuation (e.g., electroactive polymers, shape memory materials);
- Morphology–actuation co-design and morphological computation;
- Energy-efficient and adaptive actuation strategies;
- Distributed and embodied control enabled by actuation;
- Actuation for soft robotics and continuum systems;
- Fluidic, pneumatic, and hydraulic bio-inspired actuation;
- Learning and adaptation in actuator-rich systems;
- Design and modeling methodologies of bio-inspired actuators.
Dr. Steve Davis
Dr. Hamid Isakhani
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 submissions that pass pre-check are 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 250 words) can be sent to the Editorial Office for assessment.
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-anonymized 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 2400 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
- bio-inspired actuation
- soft robotics
- embodied intelligence
- compliant mechanisms
- morphological computation
- actuator design
- embodied control
- continuum robots
- adaptive systems
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