Using microrobots to perform complex teamwork: a new project with DARPA financing (video)

Probably, any representative of the community at least once paid attention to the coordinated work of social insects, be it ants, bees or wasps. Colonies of social insects can perform very complex work, which so far is beyond the power of man-made devices.

But if you could teach robots to work together, like the same ants, you could do very delicate and complex work. For example, on the assembly of electronic devices, or there is repair in hard to reach places. So far, all this is a matter of the distant future, but experts are already trying to create something similar.
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For well-coordinated work of miniature robots, scientists use a magnetic field (Diamagnetic Micro Manipulation, DM3) using printed circuit boards (PCB). Micro robots are made of inexpensive magnets. All this allows you to cheaply create a large number of such systems. A special program manipulates the magnetic field, which, in turn, controls the robots.

The system can be configured to work as 1-2 robots, and their groups (in any quantity). Despite their small size, robots move very quickly (a meter in a couple of seconds), and do their job accurately.



According to the developers, DM3 can be used to create prototypes of any devices, assemble electronic circuits, conduct biotechnological work, assemble mechanical devices. All this can be scaled if necessary, with the involvement of hundreds of microrobots. It is clear that the control program is quite complicated, but over time, you can create basic algorithms that will be used to create more complex patterns of system behavior.

Funding for this project, by the way, is carried out under the DARPA, Open Manufacturing program.



Via SRI International