This robot’s parts are helpless alone, but turn smart as they team up
When you imagine a robot, you might picture R2-D2 in Star Wars, the Omnidroid from The Incredibles or the big-armed machines that build cars on an assembly line. But there’s a new robotic system that doesn’t resemble any of these. Instead, it looks like some kids forgot to pick up their toys.
The robot is a collection of plastic, neon-green disks. Each is about 15 centimeters (6 inches) across. Alone, a single disk can’t do much of anything. It can only expand and contract.
But when a bunch of disks huddle together, things change. Tiny magnets on the disks’ outer rims make them stick together. When one disk expands or shrinks, it pushes or pulls on its neighbors. All of those small pushes and pulls add up. Suddenly the entire blob starts to move — very slowly.
The designers refer to each individual disk is a “particle.” When working as a system, they become what the designers call a “particle robot.” The researchers shared their invention March 20 in Nature. In the new study, they also showed how such a particle robot can accomplish simple tasks, like shuffling toward a light.
“It’s an innovative mechanism,” says Katia Sycara. She’s a computer scientist at Carnegie Mellon University in Pittsburgh, Pa., who designs multi-robot systems. She did not work on the new invention. But she says it illustrates the wild variety of ways that people can build robotic systems.
Read more at Science News for Students.
Image: SHUGUANG LI/COLUMBIA ENGINEERING