Japanese researchers have developed a facial robot with ‘living’ skin made from human cells that provide it with biological functionalities and expressiveness, which could contribute to the study of wrinkle formation or reduce the use of animals in cosmetic tests. and medications.
The team, led by industrial mechanics professor Shoji Takeuchi, from the Institute of Industrial Science at the University of Tokyo, used cells and extracellular matrix to create the coating equivalent to the dermis and also managed to develop a unique structure to anchor that skin to the robot. that imitates human ligaments, allowing you to smile.
Goodbye silicone rubber
Most current humanoid robots use silicone rubber to emulate the softness of human skin, but to make the surface of their robot more human-like the Japanese team grew human skin cells and created their ‘living’ skin. , about 2 millimeters thick and 25 millimeters in diameter, with a layer of dermis and another of epidermis.
The conventional method for attaching tissues to artificial objects, such as a robot’s face, is to hook them on protrusions, but this makes their expressions strange when they move.
New anchoring method allows flexible skin tissue to adapt to any shape it is attached to
Japanese researchers have developed a mechanism that joins tissue into perforations on the surface of the robot, inspired by the structure of human ligaments, allowing movements to be more fluid and natural.
The skin they have grown “has the potential to be an ideal covering material for robots due to its biological functionalities,” the team explains in the study, published Wednesday in the open access journal Cell Reports Physical Science, and they hope it will contribute “to advances in biohybrid robotics.”
Self-healing ability
“A particularly notable aspect of this method is its ability to provide robots with self-healing capabilities inherent to biological skin,” especially useful “for humanoid robots that require human-like capabilities to operate in unpredictable and complex environments,” he explains. the set.
“In unpredictable environments, the small scratches and damage that inevitably occur to the robot’s skin can turn into serious damage if left unattended. Therefore, the ability to self-repair becomes a critical characteristic of humanoid robots,” the Japanese scientists add in the study.
Finger covered with similar skin
The team had already created a finger-shaped robot covered with a similar skin in the past and hopes to continue researching.
“In the future, we would like to integrate the skin with functions such as nerves and blood vessels into a robot that moves using muscles made of muscle cells to make it more human-like,” Professor Takeuchi told the Mainichi newspaper.
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