Integrated actuator-sensor system of bucky gel device

Bucky gel actuator is a novel electro-active polymer(EAP), which is a low-voltage driven dry soft actuator. It exhibits a bending motion under an applied electric current and it has also ability of sensor. Since sensor and actuator functions exist in a same device, both functions can be integrated with keeping the advantages of flexibility. In this paper, we study a parallel type actuator-sensor integrated bucky gel devices. These devices have a problem of the electric interference between the actuator signal and the sensor signal. To solve the problem, we propose two solutions; one of the solutions is that we construct the sensor system which estimates the electric interference voltage and compensate the sensor output. The other solution is that the resistivity change of the bucky gel device surface is used for the sensing. The effectiveness of the methods are demonstrated by experiments.