📦2026 Chinese New Year Holiday & ProtoTi Shipping Schedule
Dear Valued Customer,
Thank you sincerely for your continued trust and support throughout the year 🙏 As the Chinese New Year approaches, order volumes naturally increase as we prepare for the holiday season.
For our team in China, the Chinese New Year is the most important time of the year—a moment after months of hard work to reunite with family and celebrate together 🧧🏮. We truly appreciate your understanding and support during this special period.
To help you plan ahead, please find our shipping arrangements below:
Orders placed before February 1st will be shipped by the cut-off date of February 11th.
Orders placed between February 2nd and February 4th may still be shipped before February 11th, depending on production capacity.
Orders placed on or after February 5th will require extended lead time and will be shipped gradually starting February 24th.
Please note that most manufacturers in China, including ProtoTi, will pause production from February 10th to February 23rd for the Chinese New Year holiday.
If the potential delay does not fit your schedule, please let us know as soon as possible. We will be happy to assist with a refund, provided the order has not yet entered production.
Once again, thank you for your understanding and for being a valued partner of ProtoTi. For any delayed orders, we will proactively provide individual updates with confirmed delivery timelines.
On behalf of the entire ProtoTi Global Business Team, we wish you and your family a joyful, healthy, and prosperous New Year 🎉✨
A new elephant-inspired robot can do some of the most surprising tasks, from gently plucking a flower with its trunk to powerfully kicking a bowling ball. It’s all thanks to a groundbreaking design approach inspired by the body of an elephant, which combines strong legs and a soft, flexible trunk, and uses only one type of 3D printed material. What makes this robot special is not what it’s made of, but how it’s designed.
The robot was created by Professor Josie Hughes and her team at the CREATE Lab, part of the Institute of Mechanical Engineering at the École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne (EPFL) in Switzerland. The team also included postdoctoral researchers Qinghua Guan and Hung Hon Cheng, as well as PhD student Benhui Dai.
Instead of using different materials for soft and hard parts, the team found a way to shape the inside of a single material using special internal structures, or lattices. By changing the pattern of these lattices, they can make the material act soft in some areas and stiff in others. This lets them build lifelike machines that can move with strength and flexibility, just like real animals.
Lattices are like miniature building blocks or scaffolds inside a material. By changing the shape and pattern of these blocks, the researchers could control how stiff or soft each part of the robot would be. This new design method gives engineers more control over how a robot moves and feels, without needing different materials or complicated manufacturing.
Elephant robot demonstrates 3D printing technology. Image courtesy of EPFL.
In nature, animals move using muscles, tendons, and bones with different levels of stiffness. For example, an elephant’s trunk is soft and flexible, while its legs are strong and rigid. To replicate this in robotics without making systems overly complex or heavy, researchers developed two key techniques:
Topology Regulation (TR): This method gradually blends two lattice structures to create a smooth transition from soft to stiff materials.
Superposition Programming (SP): By stacking or rotating lattice patterns, this technique allows precise control over stiffness in specific directions.
Elephant robot pinches a flower with its robotic trunk. Image courtesy of EPFL.
Using these techniques, the team created a robotic elephant with a soft, flexible trunk and strong legs. The trunk is divided into three sections—twisting, bending, and rotating—and operates with only four motors and a few tendons. TR enables the trunk to gently grip objects like a flower without damaging them.
The legs use SP to form strong joints and bones, allowing the robot to walk, balance, and even kick a bowling ball. Different leg areas are designed with varying stiffness to match real elephant anatomy—for example, stiffer toes in the front and softer heels for shock absorption.
The research also demonstrates how programmable lattices can mimic a variety of joint movements, including sliding joints (foot bones), single-axis bending (knee), and dual-axis bending (toes). The trunk’s complex movement is made possible by dividing it into functional sections while maintaining smooth transitions.
Researchers note that this foam lattice design is lightweight, efficient, and ideal for motion in fluid environments. It also opens the door to integrating sensors into the structure, paving the way for more intelligent and adaptable robots.
The elephant robot created by the team uses only a single material, 3D printed with programmable lattices. It moves using motors and tendons, and thanks to its open structure, it’s fast to print, lighter in weight, and even capable of moving in water.
Inspired by how evolution shapes animals—like the flexibility of snakes or the strength of cheetahs—the team believes robots should also be tailored to their tasks. Unlike traditional multi-material approaches, their single-material lattice method simplifies production, lowers cost, and makes customization easier.
Design of the elephant robot. Image courtesy of EPFL.
This technology isn’t just for elephants. It could be used in:
The researchers also see future potential in adding sensors and smart systems into the lattice, making robots that are not only strong and adaptable, but also intelligent.
Their work proves that structure is just as powerful as material—and with the right design, a single substance can unlock a new generation of functional, animal-like robots.
*This article originally appeared on 3DPRINT.COM . Vanesa Listek is the original author of this piece.
Step into a modern kitchen, open a refrigerator, walk into an office building elevator, or observe medical equipment—in these seemingly different scenarios, one material silently underpins our lives: Stainless Steel 304. As the most common and widely used grade of austenitic stainless steel, SS304 has become an “invisible champion” in industrial manufacturing and daily life, thanks to its excellent corrosion resistance, good formability, and outstanding hygienic properties.
Since stainless steel was invented in the early 20th century, 304 stainless steel has evolved into the world’s most popular stainless steel variety, accounting for approximately 50% of the stainless steel market share. From aerospace to food processing, from architectural decoration to medical devices, this alloy occupies an irreplaceable position in modern materials science due to its unique combination of properties. This article will provide a comprehensive analysis of the chemical composition, mechanical properties, application fields, processing techniques, and selection guidelines for 304 stainless steel, offering a thorough reference for engineers, designers, purchasers, and general consumers.
In the high-stakes world of pediatric cardiology, surgeons often operate with limited information, navigating tiny, complex, and uniquely malformed hearts.
