软体机器人

Soft robotics, with the merits of safe and flexible, is attracting more and more attentions. We investigated soft robotics from the following aspects:

l  fabrication and reprogrammable;

l  actuation mechanisms, including pneumatic, magnetic field and light;

l  Motion control;

l  Applications in biomedical field, single cell transportation, environment remediation.

微纳米机器人

Robots are reshaping the manufacture industry dramatically. Akin to this, micro&nanomicrorobots are changing the observation, manipulation, fabrication at microscale. However, a plethora of challenges are to be tackled before the massive application of micro&nanomicrorobots. In Wei’s group, we are currently carrying out research work in the following topics:

l  Visible light driven microrobots;

l  Magnetic micro&nanorobots;

l  Photothermal actuated microrobots;

l  Water pollutant remediation with microrobots;

l  Artificial water splitting actuation for microrobots.

细胞生物力学

Cell biomechanics is a nice biomarker of living cells. The characterization of cell biomechanics can tell much information, including the status of the cell, whether it is a cancer cell. However, many factors contribute to the cell mechanics characterization using AFM. In order to obtain the essence of cell biomechanics, we conducted research work on this topic through the combination of AFM characterization and finite element simulation. The essence of cell mechanics is demonstrated to be poroelastic. And the biomechanics nature of living cells changes dramatically during the mitosis process. Then, we also studied the separated cell nuclei biomechanics, which has been revealed to be poroelastic.