Stab these soft robots and they’ll self-heal instantly
Materials are an integral part of many products, and ones that can self-heal will help extend the life and usefulness of the products they're used to make.
Key takeaways
- Robots already seem to have a great bag of tricks to draw on.
- Additionally, they are useful for working alongside humans, such as in factory lines, where softer robots or robotic arms will help avoid harmful accidents.
- In the future, Vanderborght and his colleagues want to make the self-healing properties automatic, either by altering the material or by making robots that can apply heat themselves.
Cite or link to this article
Griffin, M. (2018) 'Stab these soft robots and they’ll self-heal instantly', 311 Institute, 2 June. Available at: https://www.311institute.com/these-soft-self-healing-robot-hands-regenerate-after-being-stabbed/ (Accessed: 1 October 2026).
Robots already seem to have a great bag of tricks to draw on. They can balance, run, even do back flips, and then there’s their super human strength, the ability to feel, and their hive minds, and their supple 3D printed human skin finish, but now they’ve acquired another trick, the ability to self-heal. Roboticists have long wanted to make robots out of soft flexible materials but unfortunately many of those materials are prone to breaking and splitting, but that is all about to change thanks to a new breakthrough in self-healing materials that lets soft robots who get too close to sharp pointy things heal themselves.
To prove the new self-material works researchers at the Free University of Brussels (VUB) in Belgium, who published their work in Science Robotics, created a gripper, made from a robot hand and a synthetic muscle, all with the ability to self-heal, out of rubbery polymers that look a bit like jelly that when ripped or cut were able to knit themselves back together completely. And all the team had to do was apply some gentle heat.
“The polymer we created has lots of different strands that lock together to form the material. When you add heat, they reorganise to stick back together without leaving any weak spots,” says Bram Vanderborght, who led the research.
The soft materials are ideal for picking up delicate items like fruit or veg, so could find uses in the agricultural industry as fruit harvesting robots, like these ones, or in the food packing industry, perhaps in vertical farms, or in online grocery companies warehouses. Additionally, they are useful for working alongside humans, such as in factory lines, where softer robots or robotic arms will help avoid harmful accidents.
In the future, Vanderborght and his colleagues want to make the self-healing properties automatic, either by altering the material or by making robots that can apply heat themselves.
“At the moment when ordinary robot parts break they have to be replaced, but that’s soon going to change,” he says.
FAQ
Why does this matter?
Materials are an integral part of many products, and ones that can self-heal will help extend the life and usefulness of the products they're used to make.
About the author
Matthew Griffin Founder, 311 Institute
Matthew Griffin is a multi-award winning Futurist and expert in Disruption and Innovation, Geopolitics, Leadership, and Technology, who NASA have described as a "walking encyclopaedia of the future" and a "futurist Polymath."
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Matthew Griffin is a multi-award winning Futurist and expert in Disruption and Innovation, Geopolitics, Leadership, and Technology, who NASA have described as a "walking encyclopaedia of the future" and a "futurist Polymath." 15-time best selling author of the "Codex of the Future" series, Matthew is the Founder and Futurist in Chief of the 311 Institute, a global Futures and Deep Futures advisory firm working with royal households, world leaders, G7, G20, and G77 governments, NGOs, and multi-national mid and mega cap firms to help them explore, shape, and lead the next 50 years of business and society.
An award-winning YouTube creator with over a million followers, with an unrivalled global reach and impact, Matthew is a highly sought-after international keynote speaker, lecturer, and mentor who collaborates with global leaders through the United Nations Alliance of Civilizations (UNAOC) and United Nations General Assembly (UNGA) to shape pivotal initiatives such as the UN’s AI for Humanity program, the United Nations Conference of the Parties (UN COP), and the World Economic Forum in Davos.
As the former Global Head of Cloud, National Security, and Enterprise Sales for companies including Atos, Dell-EMC, and IBM, Matthew has a proven track record of building multi-billion dollar business units and turning failing divisions into market leaders. His ability to identify, analyse, and communicate the implications of hundreds of emerging technologies and trends is unparalleled, and his insights are trusted by many of the world’s most respected organisations, including ABB, Accenture, Adidas, AON, ARM, BCG, Centrica, Citi, Coca-Cola, Dentons, Deloitte, Dow Jones, EY, Google, KPMG, Lego, Legal & General, LinkedIn, Microsoft, PepsiCo, Qualcomm, RWE, Samsung, Siemens AG and Siemens Energy, T-Mobile, UBS, VISA, Walmart, Workday, Worldpay and many others.
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Sources and further reading
- Free University of Brussels vub.ac.be
- Eaan4268 robotics.sciencemag.org
- rubbery polymers that look a bit like jelly newscientist.com
Source: first published by the 311 Institute on 2 June 2018. Cite as: Griffin, M. (2018). Stab these soft robots and they’ll self-heal instantly. 311 Institute. https://www.311institute.com/these-soft-self-healing-robot-hands-regenerate-after-being-stabbed/
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