homehome Home chatchat Notifications


Scientists devise tiny robot insects that can't be crushed by a flyswatter

The soft robots are propelled by hair-thin artificial muscles.

Tibi Puiu
December 19, 2019 @ 7:03 pm

share Share

In the future, swarms of tiny flying soft robots could zip through the sky, performing various tasks such as monitoring the environment, remote repairs, perhaps even pollination. In Switzerland, engineers have recently demonstrated a new type of insect-like flying robots that may do just that. But don’t let their fragile appearance deceive you — these tiny bots are so strong they can resist being battered by a flyswatter.

The DEAnsect. Credit: EPFL.

Central to the proper functioning of this tiny soft robot, known as DEAnsect, are artificial muscles. Researchers at the École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne (EPFL) in Switzerland fitted the thumbnail-sized robots with dielectric elastomer actuators (DEAs) — hair-thin artificial muscles — which propel the artificial insects at about 3cm/second through vibrations.

Each DEA contains an elastomer membrane sandwiched between two soft electrodes. When a voltage is applied, the electrodes come together, compressing the membrane; once the voltage is switched off, the membrane returns to its original size. Each of the robot’s legs has three such muscles.

The vibrations caused by switching the artificial muscles on and off (up to 400 times a second) allows the DEAnsect to move with a high degree of accuracy, as demonstrated in experiments in which the robots followed a maze (shown in the video).

These extremely thin artificial muscles allowed the entire design to be streamlined in a very compact frame. The power source only weighs 0.2 grams, while the entire robot, battery and other components included, weighs one gram.

“We’re currently working on an untethered and entirely soft version with Stanford University. In the longer term, we plan to fit new sensors and emitters to the insects so they can communicate directly with one another,” said Herbert Shea, one of the authors of the new study published in Science Robotics.

share Share

Pluto's Moons and Everything You Didn't Know You Want to Know About Them

Pluto may have been demoted to non-planet status, but it still commands a court of five moons, as is fitting for the king of darkness; after all, Pluto is the Roman equivalent of the Greek God Hades. For decades, we knew almost nothing about these moons but in 2015, the New Horizons mission changed that. […]

Japan Is Starting to Use Robots in 7-Eleven Shops to Compensate for the Massive Shortage of Workers

These robots are taking over repetitive jobs and reducing workload as Japan combats a worker crisis.

This Bizarre Martian Rock Formation Is Our Strongest Evidence Yet for Ancient Life on Mars

We can't confirm it yet, but it's as close as it gets.

A small, portable test could revolutionize how we diagnose Alzheimer's

A passive EEG scan could spot memory loss before symptoms begin to show.

Forget the wild-haired savages. Here's what Vikings really looked like

Hollywood has gravely distorted our image.

Is a Plant-Based Diet Really Healthy for Your Dog? This Study Has Surprising Findings

You may need to revisit your dog's diet.

Who Invented Russian Roulette? How a 1937 Short Story Sparked the Deadliest "Game" in Pop Culture

Russian Roulette is deadly game that likely spawned from a work of fiction.

What Do Ancient Egyptian Mummies Smell Like? "Woody", "Spicy" and Even "Sweet"

Scientists used an 'electronic nose' (and good old biological sniffers) to reveal the scents of ancient mummies.

A Massive Seaweed Belt Stretching from Africa to the Caribbean is Changing The Ocean

The Great Atlantic Sargassum Belt hit a record 37.5 million tons this May

Stone Age Atlantis: 8,500-Year-Old Settlements Discovered Beneath Danish Seas

Archaeologists took a deep dive into the Bay of Aarhus to trace how Stone Age people adapted to rising waters.