Scientists Create World’s Tiniest Walking Robot
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Engineers at Northwestern University have created a 0.5 mm wide, the tiny walking robot that can bend, twist, crawl, walk, turn and even jump. The crab-shaped robot does all of this without any actuators, motors, hydraulics or electricity. To construct the robot, the researchers used a shape-memory alloy material that transforms to its ‘remembered’ shape when heated. To manufacture such a tiny robot, scientists turned to a technique they introduced eight years ago a pop-up assembly method inspired by a child’s pop-up book. First, they fabricated precursors to the walking crab structures in flat, planar geometries. Then, they bonded these precursors onto a slightly stretched rubber substrate. When the stretched substrate is relaxed, a controlled buckling process occurs that causes the crab to ‘pop up’ into precisely defined 3D forms. With this manufacturing method, the authors could develop robots of various shapes and sizes.
