Pick-and-place of micro/nano sized objects means handling of very tiny and very different in properties objects having specific behavior. Besides formal requirements of assembly processes, the tools for controllable manipulation with these objects should not affect the examined micro/nano environment, i.e. should be “small and passive” in any sense. Despite of the recent progress, most availabl...

conjugated polymer actuators can be employed to achieve micro and nano scale precision, and have a wide range of applications including biomimetic robots, and biomedical devices. in comparison to robotic joints, they do not have friction or backlash, but on the other hand, they have complicated electro-chemo-mechanical dynamics which makes modelling and control of the actuator really difficult....

A continuing trend these days is the use of micro-electro-mechanical actuators with electronic circuitry to fabricate MEMS devices such as micro-switches, hard disks, optical micro-mirrors ... One of the problems with the electrostatic MEMS actuator is that when an electrical voltage is applied to these devices, the micro-actuators undergo a residual vibration before reaching their permanent po...

This paper analyses scale effects for actuator types which are strong candidates for micro-actuation: shape memory alloys (SMAS), electrostatic, electromagnetic and piezoelectric actuators. SMA actuators are studied in detail and compared to the other actuator types on a basis of force, response time, and power densi~. Much of the analysis is based on thermal aspects and scaling effects on both...

Massive actuator arrays found their applications in robotics, pharmaceutics, aerospace, etc. Compared with electrically and/or pneumatically powered actuator array, hydraulic actuator has the comprehensive advantages of higher force density (i.e. force / actuation area), better controllability, and simpler remote control accessibility. This paper presents approaches to construct and control a m...

Common quasi-static electrostatic micro actuators have significant limitations in deflection due to electrode separation and unstable drive regions. State-of-the-art electrostatic actuators achieve maximum deflections of approximately one third of the electrode separation. Large electrode separation and high driving voltages are normally required to achieve large actuator movements. Here we rep...