SBIR Phase I: Compact Haptic Actuators Using Electroosmotic Pumps

The broader/commercial impact of this Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) Phase I project includes creating quality, highly productive jobs for working class Americans by using extended reality (XR) to embody and operate robots using the sense of touch. The proliferation of general-purpose robotics is of generational significance, affecting every single American, and potentially multiplying national economic production by adding millions of helping hands to accomplish the work of the nation. With teleoperation in XR, workers can virtually step into robot bodies to perform their jobs from home in safe, ergonomic conditions, while also amplifying their productivity by operating 2-5 robots at once with AI assistant routines. However, 99% of all American jobs require fine manipulation with the sense of touch. This project advances development of the first reliable, commercially viable, high-definition haptic hardware that allows a person to feel what the robot feels and perform physical jobs virtually. This electrohydrodynamics research seeks to understand factors influencing reliability of electroosmotic pumps for useful mechanical work. This foundational piece of research will advance global technological leadership for the company and allow manufacturing and sales of the core product, aiming to control ten thousand helping robot hands by year 3.

This Small Business Innovation Research Phase I project enables a commercially viable haptic display for the first time. By imprinting high fidelity tactile images on the skin through inflated bubble-like actuators acting as haptic pixels, these displays can be used to feel localized contact, edges, shapes, textures, and vibrations - the key primitives of the sense of touch. These haptic displays can be embedded in XR interfaces such as lightweight wireless gloves to feel objects in virtual environments. Underlying these haptic displays is a new method of creating extremely compact actuator arrays based on electrohydrodynamics, specifically electroosmotic flow. This seeks to establish a new class of commercially viable mechanical actuator. Unlike legacy actuators like electromagnetic motors or piezoceramics, the basic operating limits, performance metrics, failure modes, and predictive models are not well established or explained in literature. This project aims to establish foundational knowledge of the electroosmotic pump system by first developing improved methods to measure key physical parameters. Then, pump performance will be characterized in controlled conditions to isolate and identify degradation modes.

This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.

Award Number: 2507634
Principal Investigator: Joseph Mullenbach
Funds Obligated: $304,991
State: IL