Together with Erik Steltz and Annan Mozeika from iRobot (link) we developed a new approach to soft robotics that utilizes particulate jamming technology to modulate the direction and magnitude of the work performed by a single central actuator. Jamming “activators” modulate work by jamming and unjamming (solidifying and liquifying) a granular medium coupled to a core actuator. These ideas are demonstrated in the Jamming Skin Enabled Locomotion (JSEL) JamBot prototype which can morph its shape and achieve locomotion.

The YouTube video below shows the basic principles (this clip received >750,00 hits in its first 3 months and has > 1,000,000 by now).

1. •E. Steltz, A. Mozeika, N. Rodenberg, E. Brown, and H. M. Jaeger, "JSEL: Jamming Skin Enabled Locomotion," in Proc. IEEE/RSJ International Conference on Intelligent Robots and Systems (IROS), 10-15 Oct. 2009; pp. 5672-5677 (2009). link to article
   

Read press and blogs about the JamBot on IEEE Spectrum ("This is by far one of the coolest and weirdest robot prototypes we at IEEE Spectrum have ever seen..." ), Mad Science, RobotLiving, or ScienceRay.