Cat paw-inspired magnetorheological elastomer embedded mechanical metamaterials with active sensing and switching stiffness for vibration isolator

Real-time vibration monitoring, assessment, and isolation play critical roles in the safety and maintenance of engineering industries and traffic facilities. Recently, magnetorheological elastomers (MRE) with tunable stiffness have been considered promising solutions for vibration isolation. However, for some heavy-load conditions, such as motors or machine tools, MRE vibration isolators are insufficient for realizing vibration sensing and high bearing capacity. Therefore, it is critical to design a novel MRE isolator system that enables real-time vibration monitoring, isolation, and bearing capacity. Herein, we propose a cat's paw-inspired oct-MRE vibration isolator coupled with a soft MRE for energy buffering embedded in octet metamaterials to support the load. For vibration sensing, a sliding triboelectric nanogenerator (TENG) was constructed using polytetrafluoroethylene (PTFE) and a copper foil around the oct-MRE inside a vibration isolator to monitor and evaluate the vibration state in real-time. Experimental tests show that our all-in-one vibration isolator can monitor motor vibration accurately and actively modulate it under resonant conditions, the vibration acceleration can be reduced from 17.0 m/s2 to 12.9 m/s2. This study provides an ideal solution for intelligent health monitoring of motors and other autonomous, smart, and long-term engineering tasks.