Soft Actuator with DN-gel Dispersed with Magnetic Particles

We used double-network-gel (DN-gel) to develop a new magnetic gel. Agar and Poly-acrylamide gels were selected to prepare Agar/PAAm DN-gel. We dispersed magnetic particles in this gel to fabricate a soft actuator or soft robot. Our modified DN-gel, Agar/PAAm, was suitable for this purpose. During the preparation, we employed thermal initiator instead of UV-initiator, which is popular for DN-gel, for crosslinking. The material contains magnetic particles so that it is difficult to use UV-light. The particles prevent from transmit the light. In this process, we employed thermal initiator so that UV-light is unnecessary. We also propose a micro patterning system of magnetic properties using laser scanning. CO₂ laser was employed for local heating, which can make reversible transformation of gel-liquid states. Finally, we demonstrated a simple strip soft actuator using the proposed method with DN-gel.