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This paper describes a series of endurance and material property tests conducted on a pneumatic, fabric-reinforced inflatable soft actuator made of Dragon Skin 30 silicone, which exhibited performance variations during operation. It is important to understand the level of variation over time and how it affects the motions of the soft actuators. The tests were designed to investigate the repeatability and durability of the actuator by measuring changes in its trajectories after long working periods, determining its failure pressure, and examining its elasticity through tensile tests. The experiments were performed on multiple soft actuators, and the results show pertinent information about the variation in their motion and how it relates to the material behavior of the silicone. This information enhances our understanding of the real-world behavior of silicone soft actuators and enables us to better control their performance in our applications. 

Quantification of gait changes in response to altered environmental stimuli may allow for improved understanding of the mechanisms that influence gait changes and fall occurrence in older adults. This study explored how systematic manipulation of a single dimension of one’s environment affects spatiotemporal gait parameters. A total of 20 older adult participants walked at a self-selected pace in a constructed research hallway featuring a mobile wall, which allowed manipulation of the hallway width between three conditions: 1.14 m, 1.31 m, and 1.48 m. Spatiotemporal data from participants’ walks were captured using an instrumented GAITRite mat. A repeated measures ANOVA revealed older adults spent significantly more time in double support in the narrowest hallway width compared to the widest, but did not significantly alter other spatiotemporal measures. Small-scale manipulations of a single dimension of the environment led to subtle, yet in some cases significant changes in gait, suggesting that small or even imperceptible environmental changes may contribute to altered gait patterns for older adults.