Photo: University of Washington
Taking inspiration from the Harvard RoboBee microbot design,
RoboFly is comparable to the size of a bumblebee with a weight of only 190
milligrams (nearly the weight of a toothpick). When an infrared laser is
directed at a tiny photovoltaic cell, 250 mW of power allows the robotic insect
to take flight.
Powering small-scale robots has been a fundamental problem
in development. To combat this issue, most tiny robots rely on tethers; RoboFly
instead explores the use of lasers. Due to the innovative problem-solving of roboticists
from the University of Washington, in Seattle, RoboFly is now the first
insect-sized robot to perform untethered flight at its small scale.
Currently, the UW team has achieved a range of control of up
to 1.23m indoors. However, future developments are looking into increasing this
range through the implementation of more powerful lasers. Robofly developers
are also looking into the use of lasers that track and indefinitely power the continuous
flight of the microbot.
Read more
about this fascinating discovery at: https://spectrum.ieee.org/automaton/robotics/robotics-hardware/laser-powered-robot-insect-achieves-lift-off
View
RoboFly at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KKEbJOi2_hA
Read the
study at: https://homes.cs.washington.edu/~gshyam/Papers/wirelessfly.pdf
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