MIT Engineers Develop Breakthrough Synthetic Muscle Made From Nylon Fibers

Nylon itself is a thermoplastic material, and two researchers at MIT have discovered that twisted coils of compressed nylon filament (see below) can be shaped and heated in such a way as to “mimic basic linear muscle activity,” per MIT News.

This image shows the fabrication steps from raw circular filament to a fully functional bending artificial muscle. (Felice Frankel and Seyed Mohammad Mirvakili)

The breakthrough is of particular relevance to the duplication of bending motions typical to human fingers and limbs, and the use of nylon fiber makes it both inexpensive and long-lasting. (Previous solutions have tended to be either one or the other.)

Though the nomenclature calls to mind entire synthetic limbs, MIT professor (and report coauthor) Ian Hunter suggests more down-to-earth applications: snug-fitting clothing or footwear, self-adjusting catheters and other biomedical devices or, less immediately, adjustable vehicle panels that respond to speed and wind or solar panels that orient themselves toward the sun.

Learn more about the artificial muscle breakthrough in the video below.

—Relaxnews with additional reporting by the RealClearLife staff