Fig. 5. Development of soft robotic microdevices actuated by spherical MAs. (a) An angular jaw gripper with rotating arms. (b) The parallel jaw gripper and the corresponding simulation results. (c) Flextensional mechanism integrated into the gripping mechanism to convert contraction of the actuator into extension of the arms. (d) The free displacement of the arm is plotted for different geometrical mechanism designs along with the simulation results and solutions of the analytical equations. (e) Fluorescence image of a representative spheroid stained for the nuclei. (f) Compression of a spheroid. The forward movement of the piston is provided by the inversion and amplification of actuator strain using a flextensional mechanism. Scale bars, 100 μm.