Magnetic field-enhanced vertical integration enables embodied intelligence in untethered soft robots

Abstract

Embodied intelligence in soft robotics offers unprecedented capabilities for operating in uncertain, confined, and fragile environments that challenge conventional technologies. However, achieving true embodied intelligence requires continuous environmental sensing, real-time control, and autonomous decision-making. This work develops deformation-resilient flexible batteries with enhanced performance under magnetic fields and integrates actuator, battery, and sensor modules vertically in a manta ray-inspired soft robot. The resulting untethered platform demonstrates sensing, communication, stable power supply, perturbation correction, obstacle avoidance, and temperature monitoring during magnetically actuated locomotion.