▎ 摘　　要

A three-dimensional heat transfer numerical model is proposed here for the soft-body caterpillar-like robots to present insights for biologists and engineers understanding heat-induced locomotion of these robots. Thermal field distribution of the soft robot body made by the polymer composites is firstly modeled by the use of computational fluid dynamic methodology. The computed spatial distributions of thermal fields were subsequently compared with experimental ones. The achieved agreement between numerical and experimental results further validated the numerical methodology well. Uniformity of thermal field, uniformity factors and typical temperatures for the soft robot body are numerically calculated in details. The results demonstrated that power density P, body size W and thermal conductivity (graphite content) Kr have significant effects in the spatial distributions of heat transfer. Furthermore, the specific volume ratio and optimal structural configuration of the heating sources (GS composites: graphene sheets and pliable polydimethylsiloxane) and substrates (pure PDMS: polydimethylsiloxane) are determined upon that the maximum elongation is achieved at different operation conditions of P, W and Kr respectively. Present research could contribute to the remotely powered and controlled soft robots made by polymer composites. (C) 2017 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.