Prototype of 32-Joint Robot Hand Using Shape Memory Gel and Tendon-Driven Mechanism

This paper presents the prototype of a robot hand using shape memory gel (SMG) and tendon-driven mechanism based on our concept. The finger of the robot hand can be designed to have many bendable parts which can be considered as joints. The number of the motors can be smaller than that of bendable parts. We can select a bending part of the finger as desired. Bending part of the SMG finger is heated by nichrome wires and becomes soft enough to be easily bent by tendon-driven mechanism. An efficient driver circuit for heating many parts of SMG by many nichrome wires is proposed. Examples of finger motion and grasping an object are performed to show the effectiveness of our concept.