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Developed at the University of Bristol, the new system could pave the way for smaller, lighter and more effective flying robots for environmental monitoring, search and rescue, and deployment in hazardous environments.
Until now, typical flapping micro-robots have used motors, gears and other complex transmission systems to achieve the up-and-down motion of the wings, bringing added complexity, weight and undesired dynamic effects.
Taking inspiration from bees and other flying insects, Bristol engineers led by Professor Jonathan Rossiter successfully demonstrated a direct-drive artificial muscle system, called the Liquid-Amplified Zipping Actuator (Laza), which achieves wing motion using no rotating parts or gears.
The Laza system greatly simplifies the flapping mechanism, enabling future miniaturisation of flapping robots down to the size of insects.
In a new research paper, the team showed how a pair of Laza-powered flapping wings could provide more power than insect muscle of the same weight, enough to fly a robot across a room at a speed of 18 body lengths per second.
They also demonstrated how the system can deliver consistent flapping over more than one million cycles, important for making flapping robots that can undertake long flights.
The researchers said they expect Laza to be adopted as a fundamental building block for a range of autonomous insect-like flying robots.
Lead author and developer of the Laza system, Dr Tim Helps, said: “With the Laza, we apply electrostatic forces directly on the wing, rather than through a complex, inefficient transmission system. This leads to better performance, simpler design, and will unlock a new class of low-cost, lightweight flapping micro-air vehicles for future applications, like autonomous inspection of offshore wind turbines.”
Professor Rossiter said: “Making smaller and better-performing flapping wing micro-robots is a huge challenge. Laza is an important step toward autonomous flying robots that could be as small as insects and perform environmentally critical tasks such as plant pollination, and exciting emerging roles such as finding people in collapsed buildings.”
The research was published in Science Robotics.
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