Researchers at MIT have developed next-generation drones inspired by insects. Chen, a member of the Electrical and Computer Science Department and Electronics Research Laboratory, designed insect-sized drones with unparalleled dexterity and resilience. Check out the video below to see them in action and learn more. The actuators of the drone can flutter almost 500 times per second, which gives the drone an insect-like movement and properties and weighs only 0.6 grams.
“If you’ve ever knocked a mosquito off your face to make it come back again and again, you know that insects in flight can be remarkably acrobatic and resilient. These properties help them to find their way around the air world with all its gusts of wind, obstacles and general uncertainties. Such properties are also difficult to build into flying robots, but MIT Assistant Professor Kevin Yufeng Chen has developed a system that approximates the mobility of insects.
Usually, drones require large open spaces, as they are neither nimble enough to navigate in tight spaces, nor robust enough to withstand collisions in a crowd. “If we look at most of the drones today, they’re usually pretty big,” says Chen. “Most of her uses involve flying in the open air. The question is: can you make insect-scale robots that can move around in very complex, crowded spaces? “
“The construction of insect-like robots offers an insight into the biology and physics of insect flight, a long-standing research path for researchers. Chen’s work addresses these issues through a kind of reverse engineering. “If you want to learn how insects fly, it is very educational to build a full-scale robot model,” he says. “You can disturb some things and see how this affects the kinematics or how the fluid forces change. This will help you understand how these things fly. “However, Chen wants to add more than just entomology textbooks. Its drones can also be useful in industry and agriculture. “
Source: MIT: Adafruit
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