Most of the time, it’s a bit frustrating to write about nanobots. We have to talk about them in the context of teeny tiny little scales that you can’t really identify with… 250 microns long? What does that even MEAN? CMU’s nanobots are barely, just barely, large enough to identify with. They’re about the size of a grain of sand, and you can see one in action alongside a penny:

So yeah, that’s still pretty nano, but I at least feel like I have some conception of the bot’s actual size rather than having to rely on an abstract measurement. These little guys are controlled via an external magnetic field, and by rocking back and forth very quickly, they can reach a top speed of 13 mm (60 body lengths) per second. They’re capable of movement on surfaces that are generally smooth and non-stick, and will work equally well underwater. Although most people would call these things micro-robots, all they really are are solid little magnets being pushed around by other magnets… But that’s okay, we’ll let it slide, ’cause they’re little and cute and all.

[ CMU Nanorobotics Lab ] VIA [ Communist Robot ]

If you thought these bots were small, Duke University’s microbots are smaller. Much smaller. Measured in microns (that’s millionths of a meter), they’re 100 times smaller than any similar design at 250 microns long, 60 microns wide, and 10 microns high. The floor that the robots are dancing around in the above video is a mere millimeter across.

The tricky part (one of the tricky parts) about robots this small is getting them to do what you want them to do. These microbots move forward in tiny (10 billionths of a meter) but quick (20,000 per second) little steps in response to electrical impulses applied to the surface they’re located on. To turn, a different signal pulls one end of the bot to the surface, creating a pivot point. By slightly altering the way each bot responds to the “turn” signal, a bunch of them can be controlled at the same time, and fancy math can get the group to respond in specific ways.

Look for these bots microbots to be showing up probably a long time from now in a brain cell near you.

[ Duke University ] VIA [ Engadget ]

Robot soccer comes in all shapes and sizes. Including very, very, VERY small sizes. This weekend, NIST (the guys who keep track of what time it is) will host a RoboCup nanosoccer exhibition match, where the playing field is smaller than a grain of rice and the robots involved are about the same width as two of your hairs (the picture of bots on a playing field above was taken with a scanning electron microscope). Let me try and put that in perspective… Here’s a soccer nanobot perched on a grain of salt:

Rules of the game, and video, after the jump. (Read more…)

Robotics researchers have long been envious of flying insects, many of which are able to perform all sorts of spectacular acrobatics despite their small wings and smaller brains. Researchers at Harvard University have created a robotic fly the size of a penny that is actually able to fly using a wing structure and motions based on, you guessed it, a fly. The robofly weighs 60 milligrams (the equivalent of a few grains of rice), and beats its 1.5cm wings 120 (!) times per second. Most impressively, the actuating composite motor that powers the wings is 5 times more powerful for its weight than the muscles of a real fly.

You’ll notice in the video that the robofly takes off while attached to wires. Currently, there is no on-board power source, although that’s step 3. Step 2 is going to be making the fly controllable somehow, which (I’m guessing) is going to be (to put it mildly) tricky. Robert Wood, the designer of the fly, is taking a very biological approach to the project, but he’s not letting it constrain him, which I find to be pretty progressive:

Success meant that Wood could finally turn to those questions that weren’t worth asking until the fly took off: Is the shape of a fly’s wings (a less-than-optimal design which Wood improved on in his robotic version) a biological limitation, or does it somehow aid the fly’s aerodynamics? Does a four-winged insect offer a design improvement? Even questions of evolutionary biology come into play: Why did all the four-winged arthropod flyers of the late Carboniferous period evolve to have two wings?

It’s great how the process of designing a biologically inspired robot may actually help to answer questions about evolutionary biology. By creating a fly from scratch, we get a glimpse of how and why flies are so good at being flies… Hopefully this same philosophy might be extended to other biobots.

[ Harvard Magazine: Robotic Fly ]

Most types self-configuring modular robots (like these and these) divert a substantial amount of time and energy towards figuring out where they are and where they need to go in relation to their other pieces. If you make the modules small enough, though, they can take advantage of the random motions generated by their environment to move around. Give them a little bit of AI, and they’ll be able to build themselves up into large and complex structures simply by selectively attaching themselves to other modules. Although the principle of operation can be observed at macro sizes, stochastic robots get more efficient at smaller scales, since you can throw more of them into close proximity with each other, increasing the chances of a favorable configuration occurring. So, imagine that you need a nanobot to perform microsurgery on your brain… Instead of implanting the robot itself, you could just be injected with a bunch of stochastic modules. As the modules bounced around in your bloodstream, they’d gradually coalesce into a functional robot, which could perform its task, and then disassemble itself for disposal. Quick, clean, and easy.

[ Cornell Computational Synthesis Lab ]

The DelFly II, developed by the Delft University of Technology, is one of those miracles of construction that, at first glance, doesn’t seem to be physically possible. In a 16 gram package, this ornithopter can fly for at least 15 minutes (at a maximum speed of 30mph) or hover in place for 8. It can take off and land vertically, and can even fly backwards. It’s fully out of sight controllable thanks to realtime onboard streaming video (!). Since it uses flapping wings, it’s quiet, efficient, and robust enough to fly comfortably in wind and survive collisions with objects. Check out the video:

The most amazing thing is that this design is the LARGE version. Currently in development is the DelFly Micro, which will be a third this size, followed by the DelFly Nano, which should have a wingspan of only 5cm, making it effectively invisible. These bots will be used for espionage (of course), but also (the designers suggest) for disaster relief or airborne pollution tracking. It’s worth noting that DelFly is based in the Netherlands, which is probably the only reason why they have yet to be consumed by the US military. Maybe, just maybe, there might be some hope of commercial availability.

Okay, probably not, but I can dream, can’t I?

[ DelFly ] VIA [ Danger Room ]

If you thought Sandia’s Mini-Robots were tiny, the pico (which they inspired) is even tinier at half the volume. It’s also much more impressive, with a top speed of 0.5 foot per second and a 15 minute runtime, and it’s 100% home built by Zac Wheeler from commercial available (until recently, anyway) parts.

Pico’s pico-ness doesn’t leave room for a very big brain, which becomes immediately obvious as the pico throws itself off of a table as soon as it’s turned on. This happens twice more in the video below, and for some reason I find it hilarious. It’s nice to see a robot with such a single minded sense of purpose. It looks like the pico is in fact able to detect (via an infrared sensor) when it runs in to something, and will change direction when it does so. It’s also supposedly able to follow a line. Not bad for a little guy the size of a dime:

Originally, pico was meant to be buildable from a kit, and also was meant to be the precursor to a whole new pico division of competitive sumo robots. Unfortunately, some critical parts have been discontinued, and the kits are “not likely to be available anytime soon.” I for one hope that whatever interest is generated by blog exposure might just convince Zac to give it another shot, ’cause I’d buy one in a picosecond.

[ pico ] VIA [ TechEBlog ]

At 1/4 cubic inch in volume and a weight of less than 1 ounce, these mini-robots being developed by Sandia National Labs may be some of the smallest autonomous untethered robots in existence. They’re powered by 3 watch batteries, and have tracked drive systems, an 8K ROM processor, a temperature sensor, and optionally a miniature camera, microphone, communication system, and chemical micro-sensor. The bodies of the robots are created through rapid-prototyping and are mostly constrained by the size of the batteries required to power them (meaning that they’ll shrink further with improvements in battery technology). With a top speed of only 20 inches per minute, each bot may not be able to get very far very fast, but they’re designed to be used in swarms to accomplish larger and more complex tasks. Video of the mini-bot driving over loose change after the jump. (Read more…)