Lantern‐Inspired Electroosmotic Actuator Enabling High Force and Large Quasi‐Static Displacement for Haptic Displays and Pulse Sensing

ABSTRACT Soft actuators capable of delivering substantial force under large quasi‐static displacement are essential for controllable human–machine interactions with realistic tactile sensations and wearable health monitoring. However, achieving such performance within lightweight architectures remains challenging due to inherent trade‐offs between force, displacement, and device size. Here, we propose a lantern‐inspired electroosmotic actuator (LIEA) that delivers excellent quasi‐static mechanical output. The lantern‐like folded membrane structure enables large deformation and high force output by minimizing parasitic elastic restoring forces. In addition, Au modification of the glass‐fiber membrane strengthens the electric field across the membrane, enhancing electroosmotic transport and further improving actuation performance. Owing to this synergistic design, the LIEA achieves comparable displacement at less than 10% of the driving voltage typically required by conventional electroosmotic actuators. We demonstrate a 3 × 3 LIEA array for static pattern and dynamic shape generation, and validate its positional cueing capability using a 2 × 2 subarray in human subjects. Moreover, a pulse sensing patch is developed, in which tunable quasi‐static loading provided by the LIEA optimizes arterial pulse acquisition and enables the extraction of multi‐dimensional pulse features. Collectively, these results showcase the LIEA as a promising platform for applications ranging from haptic displays to active‐sensing healthcare.