The Development of An Artificial Hand Using Nickel Titanium as Actuators

This work focuses on the development of an artificial hand prototype powered by Nickel Titanium actuators.

Nickel Titanium wires are used as actuators to perform the artificial muscles functions because of their reduced size, lightweight, low power consumption, vibration and noise damping, and cheap cost. Nickel Titanium wires belong to the class of metals known as Shape Memory Alloys (SMA) featuring crystal structures that can assume different shapes at distinct temperatures, this phenomenon is called the Shape Memory Effect. At low temperatures, NiTi muscle wires can be easily stretched, then when heated they return to their original shape with a usable force and speed. Conventional actuators such as DC motors, pneumatic motors, and hydraulic motors are energy-wasting, large volume, noisy, non aesthetical and heavy-mass actuation systems. Shape Memory Alloy actuators are based on metals that change phase when subjected to heat, which can be created by electric current. In this paper, we present the development of an artificial hand prototype which can perform the role of a prosthetic or robotic hand for biomedical, robotics, military, aeronautics and other industrial purposes.