Overview of the Development of Origami-inspired Robot Arms

Robotic arms have always been the enabling technology that promotes the development of human society and science technology, such as invasive surgery, intelligent manufacturing, aerospace engineering, etc. However, conventional robotic arms suffer from the disadvantages of limited DOFs, hefty weight, miniaturization difficulty, and poor human-machine interaction. The emerging soft robot arm is attracting attention for its excellent performance regarding human-machine interaction and degrees of freedom. As a novel paradigm of the soft robot arm, the origami-inspired robot arm not only reserves the advantages mentioned above but also is better at coping with more scenarios due to its inherent deformation ability. This study focuses on origami-inspired robotic arms, summarizes the commonalities of origami crease patterns capable of being used to design and make robotic arms, and addresses the state-of-the-art investigations on the driving method, intending to offer insights into the future direction of the development for origami-inspired robotic arms.