Project Grant 2438416

Award Date 6/15/25
Completion Date 5/31/29
Dollars Obligated $306K
Federal Grant Program
47.041
Assistance Type
Project Grant
Place of Performance
Schenectady, NY 12308, USA
Similar Awards
This Project Grant award from the National Science Foundation's (NSF) Engineering program (CFDA 47.041) supports the creation of a proof-of-concept robotic factory called "EVOFAB" that can autonomously design, fabricate, and test novel soft actuators powered by pressurized air. The $693,800 award to Trustees of Tufts College aims to develop an intelligent system that can rapidly explore a design space, 3D print the components, characterize their performance, and recycle failed parts...
This $454,020 Project Grant awarded by the National Science Foundation (NSF) Engineering program (CFDA 47.041) will support collaborative research at the University of Michigan to develop soft materials with embedded sensors, circuits, and actuators enabling a new class of intelligent soft robots. The goal is to create a soft robotic manipulator that can autonomously recognize and sort objects by their physical characteristics using only these advanced material components, without requiring...
This Project Grant awarded by the National Science Foundation's (NSF) Engineering program (CFDA 47.041) will fund the development of advanced, vision-based tactile gel-robots capable of perceiving and manipulating soft, fragile objects. The $312,960 award will integrate fatigue-resistant photoelastic gels, stress-interpreting photometry systems, and physics-informed machine learning to enable multi-physical perception and ultra-gentle handling capabilities. This research will advance robotics in...
This three-year project grant of $409,707 from the National Science Foundation's Engineering program (CFDA 47.041) supports research at Colorado State University to develop adaptive, rapid, and multifunctional soft robots enabled by tunable elastic instabilities. The goal is to create soft robotic devices with reconfigurable shapes and motions. The Engineering program aims to improve engineering research and education quality to foster innovation and economic strength. This award directly...
This $330,001 federal Project Grant awarded by the National Science Foundation (NSF) Engineering program (CFDA 47.041) supports a research project at Clark University on the physical principles governing the dynamics of soft, undulating filaments in granular environments. Key objectives include: Constructing prototype soft robots that can navigate through complex sediment beds, enabled by a deeper understanding of burrowing mechanics Developing theoretical models to capture the shape, speed, and...
This $325,044 federal Project Grant award from the National Science Foundation's Engineering program (CFDA 47.041) supports research to develop a new "aerodynamic fiber deposition" technology to manufacture biomimetic soft fiber-reinforced composites with spatially varying fiber arrangements. The research aims to enable the production of high-throughput, highly controlled nano/microfiber patterns that mimic the complex fiber structures found in biological tissues like skin, muscle, and...
This three-year $200,000 project grant from the National Science Foundation's Engineering program (CFDA 47.041) supports research at Case Western Reserve University to develop adaptive mechanics, learning and intelligent control technologies to improve soft robotic grasping. The university researchers will work to foster innovation in soft robotics through engineering research aimed at enabling soft robotic end effectors with enhanced grasping capabilities. Building on prior work, the project...
This $599,885 federal Project Grant award from the National Science Foundation's Engineering program (CFDA 47.041) aims to develop a bio-inspired design methodology powered by AI and fractal geometries to create probabilistic mechanical fasteners for robotic assembly tasks. The key products and services to be delivered under this 3-year project include: Advancing pattern recognition algorithms to extract essential patterns from biological attachment mechanisms to inform the conceptual design...
This National Science Foundation (NSF) Engineering Program (CFDA 47.041) Project Grant award of $240,000 supports research at Trustees of Boston University to develop autonomous artificial intelligence systems for safe human-robot interaction with soft robotic manipulators. The project aims to address key challenges in soft robot control, including meeting safety constraints, balancing compliance and strictness in control strategies, and enabling safe task transitions during contact with humans....
This $386,315 National Science Foundation project grant funds the development of a prosthetic elbow featuring novel networks of soft, thermo-active actuators for mobility-impaired patients. Awarded to the University of North Texas on October 1, 2021 under the NSF Engineering program (CFDA 47.041), the project aims to create a lightweight, portable rehabilitation technology that responds quickly through optimizing modular actuators composed of heat-absorbing peltier materials. Over its...

This $306,200 Project Grant award from the National Science Foundation's (NSF) Engineering program (CFDA 47.041) supports the development of an autonomous robotic factory called "EVOFAB" that can design, fabricate, and test novel soft actuators powered by pressurized air. The project seeks to transform the design and discovery of soft components and devices by combining innovative evolutionary algorithms with fully automated fabrication and in-situ characterization. Key aspects include a fabrication-aware evolutionary design system, high-fidelity simulations to minimize differences between predicted and real behaviors, an automated fabrication pipeline, and an integrated recycling process to maximize untended operation. The awardee, Trustees of Union College, will execute this 4-year project from June 2025 to May 2029, with the goal of creating a proof-of-concept robotic factory for the automated production of soft actuators with applications in food handling, wearable devices, surgical tools, and other domains requiring safe manipulation of fragile items.

Generated 7/1/25, 2:15 AM