Everyday fibres used to create artificial muscles

In a study published in Science, international researchers, including University of British Columbia Electrical and Computer Engineering professor John Madden and PhD candidate Seyed Mohammad Mirvakili, detail how they created inexpensive artificial muscles that generate far more force and power than human or animal muscles of the same size.

‘In terms of the strength and power of the artificial muscle, we found that it can quickly lift weights 100 times heavier than a same-sized human muscle can, in a single contraction,” Madden said in a statement. “It also has a higher power output for its weight than that of an automobile combustion engine.”

Artificial muscles have been made out of materials like metal wires and carbon nanotubes in the past but researchers and device makers have found these artificial muscles expensive to fabricate and difficult to control.

Madden and his colleagues from from universities in Australia, South Korea, the USA, Turkey and China used high-strength polymer fibres made from polyethylene and nylon that were twisted into tight coils to create an artificial muscle that could contract and relax.