Robobee By: Alec Johnson Jake Gillund. Description RoboBee is a tiny robot capable of tethered...

RobobeeBy: Alec Johnson

Jake Gillund

Description• RoboBee is a tiny robot capable of tethered flight, developed by a

research robotics team at Harvard University. The culmination of twelve years of research, RoboBee solved two key technical challenges of micro-robotics. Engineers invented a process inspired by pop-up books that allowed them to build on a sub-millimeter scale precisely and efficiently.

Nature inspiration• he concept of micro-scale flying systems was not new. The "DelFly"

(3.07 g) was capable of untethered self-controlled forwards flight, while Micromechanical Flying Insect research devices (0.1 g) had sufficient power for hovering, but lacked self-sustained flight capacity.• Based on the promise of the early robotic fly experiments, the

RoboBee project was launched in 2009 to investigate what it would take to "create a robotic bee colony".

Problem Solving• If researchers solve the microchip and power issues, it is believed that

groups of RoboBees utilizing swarm intelligence will be highly useful in search and rescue efforts and as artificial pollinators. The need for these inventions is to counteract the depolinization of plants due to the deaths of bee’s around the world

• The concept of micro-scale flying systems was not new. The "DelFly" (3.07 g) was capable of untethered self-controlled forwards flight, while Micromechanical Flying Insect research devices (0.1 g) had sufficient power for hovering, but lacked self-sustained flight capacity.• Based on the promise of the early robotic fly experiments, the

RoboBee project was launched in 2009 to investigate what it would take to "create a robotic bee colony".

Process from idea to Robobee

http://www.theguardian.com/technology/video/2013/may/03/robobee-insect-flight-demonstration-video