Dynamic Model of a Jet-Propelled Soft Robot Inspired by the Octopus Mantle

This article addresses the study of cephalopods locomotion. As a first step, we here propose an analytical model of the cephalopod mantle. The approach is based on the geometrically exact shell theory used in nonlinear structural dynamics and exploits the symmetric shape of the mantle. Once all the mathematical background is reminded we propose a first use of this model by using the constitutive laws of the shell as control laws able to reproduce the axisymmetric contractions observed in cephalopods. Further numerical exploitation of these theoretical results are to date in progress along with works in fluid mechanics.