Ultra Thin Liquid Crystal Elastomer Fiber Actuator With Liquid Metal Core

Liquid Crystal Elastomer (LCE) can be used as actuators in soft robotics. However, due to low thermal conductivity of this material, bulk LCE does not react to temperature change very

quickly, thus the actuaion period is long and it is not ideal for typical soft robotic applications. In this work I present a method to directly spin thin LCE fiber with Liquid Metal (LM) Core, which allows the LCE to heat up and cool down very fast. Thus achieving ideal actuation speed.