**4. Conclusions**

In this work, new developments on SMA actuators in the mini/micro scale are presented: the attention was focused on straight NiTi thin wires and mini/micro snake-like NiTi samples.

Several working parameters have proved to strongly affect the functional and fatigue properties of SMA actuator, such as the electrical pulse performed to heat a wire, the different drawing procedures carried out to produce the wire or the wire arrangement into the device.

Then, the functional parameters of a snake-like NiTi wire demonstrate that this kind of geometry may be a good alternative to the most common geometries. It can generate a shape recovery in a very large range of deformation comparing to the straight SMA wire. This point is very beneficial for practical uses since the new proposed SMA conformation just occupies small space to generate the same displacement as the straight one, and it demonstrates to maintain its general mechanical performance when embedded in a minimodular mechanical device. Finally, the presented fabrication process adopted for the manufacturing of micro-actuators looks to be very attractive (laser process can be performed on a large family of materials with high repeatability). The thermo-mechanical behavior of the micro-snake actuator can be considered interesting in the range of low applied load values with a good cycling stability.
