The field of soft robotics is moving towards the development of more agile, resilient, and adaptable systems. Researchers are drawing inspiration from nature, such as the anisotropic stiffness and distributed mass-energy structures found in biological organisms, to create innovative designs that can seamlessly enable a wide range of behaviors. One of the key areas of focus is the creation of soft-frame systems that can limit the trade-off between agility, squeezability, and collision resilience. This has led to the development of new actuation mechanisms, such as electrostatic film actuators and artificial muscles, that can provide high actuation stress and integrated braking capabilities. Additionally, there is a growing interest in the development of unified modeling and control frameworks that can enable independent torque and stiffness commands in real-time for diverse soft actuator types. Noteworthy papers in this area include:

• A paper on FlexiQuad, a soft-frame quadrotor design approach that achieves a high level of compliance while maintaining acrobatic maneuverability.
• A study on mechanical layer jamming systems, which provides a comprehensive experimental characterization of key design parameters and their influence on performance.
• A paper on a two-layer electrostatic film actuator with high actuation stress and integrated brake, which demonstrates improved output performance and load retention capabilities.
• A framework for decoupling torque and stiffness in antagonistic artificial muscles, which enables independent control of torque and stiffness in real-time.