Manipulating Stiffness of Biomechanical Systems to Train Muscle

A new design for the skeleton of biohybrid robots, millimeter scale soft robots powered by engineered muscle actuators, was developed to provide a binary change in stiffness. Two variations of the design were created, one using elastic 50A resin and the other PDMS. The elastic 50A resin design was fabricated successfully. The design uses a manually placed stiffening beam to create the desired change in stiffness. This would allow for the determination of the effects of training with higher stiffnesses after muscle differentiation. These biohybrid robots provide a test bed for studying engineered skeletal muscle and contribute to potential future applications in tissue engineering and biomechanical devices.

Name thesis:degree_name

Bachelor

Department dc:contributor.department

Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Department of Mechanical Engineering

Grantor dc:publisher

Massachusetts Institute of Technology

Year dc:date.issued

2022

Author dc:creator

• Thompson, Erik M.

Advisor dc:contributor.advisor

• Raman, Ritu

Statement dc:rights

• In Copyright - Educational Use Permitted
• Copyright retained by author(s)

Licence dc:rights.uri

• https://rightsstatements.org/page/InC-EDU/1.0/

Handle dc:identifier.uri

https://hdl.handle.net/1721.1/144574

OAI identifier oai:identifier

oai:dspace.mit.edu:1721.1/144574