In the year of processing research on humanoid robots, we focused on advancing a human anatomy-inspired approach for both actuation and tactile feedback. For the actuation system, a new robotic finger was designed with a significantly more accurate recreation of human-like structures compared to existing models. This novel approach incorporates a highly human-similar structure and utilizes a multi-material-based additive manufacturing method, which can produce a robot finger in ten hours with no post-assembly required. The finger was mounted on a specially designed test bench using Shape Memory Alloy (SMA) wire actuators. Test results demonstrated that this approach achieves more human-like motion compared to traditional methods. The design is currently undergoing further improvements.

Research also progressed in tactile feedback. New designs for SMA-based tactile sensors were developed, and experiments showed improved performance. The new sensor is now being miniaturized for future implementation within the robot finger’s skin. Additionally, a multi-array SMA sensor was developed and tested for cutaneous sensation. This work has been published in the international journal Actuators and presented at the international conference IEEE ICMA 2024.