Bat robot takes wing:
koryos:
Bat Bot, a lightweight flier with thin silicone wings stretched over a carbon fiber skeleton, can cruise, dive and bank turn just like its namesake, researchers report February 1 in Science Robotics.
Such
a maneuverable machine could one day soar up the towering structures of
a construction site, flying in and out of steel beams to help keep
track of a building’s progress, study coauthor Seth Hutchinson, a
roboticist at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, said in a
news briefing January 31.
Other aerial robots, like some drones,
aren’t so agile, relying on four whirling rotor blades to lift off the
ground, Hutchinson said. These bots also have trouble flying in the
wind, because they can exert force in only one direction, he said. Bat
Bot’s flexible wings could make it a more versatile flier.
“Bat
flight is the holy grail of aerial robotics,” said study coauthor
Soon-Jo Chung, a Caltech aerospace engineer. Bats have more than 40
joints in their wings, which give the animals exquisite control over
their flight maneuvers. Chung and colleagues re-created nine of the key
joints, so their robot could flap its wings in sync, fold each wing
independently and move each of its hind legs up and down. At 93 grams,
with a wingspan of 47 centimeters, Bat Bot is roughly the size of an
Egyptian fruit bat, Chung said.
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BAT BOT! BAT BOT!!!