My research focuses on the bio-inspired design and fabrication of robotic devices (e.g., soft robotics, collective robotics, and modular/cellular robotics). I aim to develop lifelike robots for industrial applications, medical assistance, human-robot interaction, and human augmentation.
These kinds of robots will adapt to environmental changes, perform new tasks, recover from damage, and safely interact with humans and other objects. My interdisciplinary approach to these important topics raises two fundamental questions: (1) How does nature organize relatively simple components to form complex biological organisms; and (2) Can we design and build engineered robotic devices and systems that operate under similar principles and perform comparably or even exceed biological performance? Towards the second question, my work can be broken into two research objectives at two different levels. Objective 1 (component-level): to explore the beneficial physical interactions between materials in different states (solid, fluid, or phase-transition) with various features (e.g., programmable stiffness) to help design robotic components/materials such as actuators, sensors, and morphing structures. Objective 2 (system-level): to exploit the organization principles of natural organisms (such as modularity, hierarchy, regularity, etc.) to design and construct complex or large-scale robotic systems, based on the components from Objective 1, through computational and experimental approaches.
My studies and articles have appeared in leading academic journals including Nature, PNAS, and Science Robotics, and have been covered by various media outlets globally, including NPR, BBC, The Economist, Wired Magazine, Discovery News, Scientific American, Forbes, Associated Press, MIT Technology Review, Xinhua News Agency, CCTV (China), CNN, etc.
Patents：
[1] H.Lipson and S.Li, Fluid Current Energy Capture Apparatus and Method, US Patent，US8, 884,496 (Granted, 2014).
[2] S.Li, R.J.Wood, D.Rus, D.Vogt, and N.W.Bartlett, Programmable Multi-Scale Fluidic Artificial Muscles and Pistons, US Patent App. 16/494,291 (2017).
Papers (selected)：
[1] S.Li, R.Batra, D.Brown, H.Chang, N.Ranganathan, C.Hoberman, D.Rus, and H.Lipson, “Particle robotics based on statistical mechanics of loosely-coupled components”, Nature, 567 (7748), 361, 2019, (Cover article).
[2] S.Li, D.Vogt, D.Rus, and R.J.Wood, “Fluid-driven origami-inspired artificial muscles”, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS), 201713450, 2017.
[3] S.Li, S.Awale, K.Bacher, T.Buchner, C.Della Santina, R.J. Wood and D Rus, “Scaling Up Soft Robotics: A Meter-Scale, Modular, and Reconfigurable Soft Robotic System”, Soft Robotics, Dec, 2021, (Cover article).
[4] S.Li and D.Rus, “Jellocube: A continuously jumping robot with soft body”, IEEE/ASME Transactions on Mechatronics, Feb. 2019.
[5] S.Li, D.Vogt, N.W.Bartlett, D.Rus, and R.J.Wood, “Tension piston: amplifying piston force using fluid-induced tension in flexible materials”, Advanced Functional Materials, May, 2019.
[6] R.Truby and S.Li, “Integrating chemical fuels and artificial muscles for untethered microrobots”, Science Robotics, 5(45):eabd7338, 2020, (Invited review article).
[7] S.Miyashita, S.Guitron, S.Li, and D.Rus, “Robotic metamorphosis by origami exoskeletons”, Science Robotics, 2(10):eaao4369, 2017.
[8] S.Li, J.Yuan, Y.Shi, and J.C.Zagal , “Growing scale-free networks with tunable distributions of triad motifs”, Physica A: Statistical Mechanics and its Applications, 428, 103-110, 2015.
[9] F.Nigl, S.Li, J.Blum, and H.Lipson, “Autonomous Truss Reconfiguration and Manipulation”, IEEE Robotics and Automation Magazine, September, 2013.
[10] S.Li, J.Yuan, and H.Lipson, “Ambient Wind Energy Harvesting using Cross-Flow Fluttering”, Journal of Applied Physics, 109(2), 2011.
[11] S.Li, J.Stampfli, H.Xu, E.Malkin, E.Diaz, D.Rus, and R.J.Wood, “A Vacuum-driven Origami Magic-ball Soft Gripper”, IEEE International Conference on Robotics and Automation, ICRA2019, Montreal, Canada, May 2019.
[12] S.Miyashita, S.Guitron, K.Yoshida, S.Li, D.Damian, and D.Rus, “Ingestible, Controllable, and Degradable Origami Robot for Patching Stomach Wounds” In IEEE International Conference on Robotics and Automation, ICRA2016, Stockholm, Sweden, May 2016.
[13] J.C.Zagal, C.Armstrong, and S.Li, “Deformable Octahedron Burrowing Robot” In the International Conference on the Synthesis and Simulation of Living Systems, ALIFE XIII, 2012.
[14] S.Li, J.Yuan, and J.C.Zagal, “Encouraging Networks Modularity by Seeding Motifs” In the European Conference on Artificial Life, ECAL2011, Paris, France, August 2011.
[15] S.Li, H.Lipson, “Vertical-Stalk Flapping-Leaf Generator For Parallel Wind Energy Harvesting” In the ASME/AIAA Conference on Smart Materials, Adaptive Structures and Intelligent Systems, SMASIS2009, Oxnard, CA, USA, Sept. 2009.
