Harvard engineers demonstrate resilient robot bee

Developed by researchers at Harvard the RoboBee, which is described in a paper in Nature, is powered by soft artificial muscles made using dielectric elastomers, soft materials with good insulating properties, that deform when an electric field is applied.

"There has been a big push in the field of microrobotics to make mobile robots out of soft actuators because they are so resilient," said Yufeng Chen, a postdoctoral fellow at Harvard’s School of Engineering and Applied Science (SEAS). "However, many people in the field have been skeptical that they could be used for flying robots because the power density of those actuators simply hasn't been high enough and they are notoriously difficult to control. Our actuator has high enough power density and controllability to achieve hovering flight."

Take a break: RoboBee saves energy with ability to perch

New Harvard RoboBee jumps from aquatic to aerial

By improving the electrode conductivity, the researchers were able to operate the actuator at 500Hz, on par with the rigid actuators used previously in similar robots.