A Cry Heard Round The World: Kim Sun-Il died desperate and alone, but he did not die unheard.
Looking At And Longing For Mars: Reflections on a childhood dream.
A Robot May Not Harm a Human Being. Is The Opposite True?: Thoughts on the future rights of artificial intelligence.
Long After The Boys Of Summer Have Gone: What makes a relationship work?
Winter Of Our Feline Discontent: What the cat wants, the cat gets. But what DOES it want?
To Tell The Truth: There may be no honor among thieves, but can't we find it even in a few good men and women?
Should The Human Brain Retire?: We know that we cannot win forever. We know that machines will continue to improve. So why don't we let the human brain retire gracefully now, with honors?
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Published: Sep 16, 2005 01:41 PM
Wed - September 3, 2003
Insectia Robotica? Flying, water-striding robots make their
debut
Three MIT researchers report in the Aug. 7 issue of Nature that they have created a mechanical water strider that can move across the surface of water using the same fluid dynamics employed by the living insect.
By combining mathematics, high-speed photography and a variety of flow visualization techniques, the scientific team discovered that water striders use the tips of their legs to create tiny valleys which they use to propel themselves at speeds up to 150 cm per second as the water surface rebounds like a trampoline.
They constructed a robot model out of a 7-Up can, stainless steel wire legs, and an elastic band coupled to a pulley to power its middle legs. Light enough not to break through the water surface, it travels half a body length per stroke. Like its natural counterpart, the Robostrider’s principal means of transferring momentum is the vortices shed by rowing action.
Meanwhile, scientists at the University of Toronto have built a working ornithopter—an aircraft that can fly by flapping its wings at speeds up to 50 mph. Once a dream of early aviation pioneers. flapping-winged flight turns out to be a rather difficult business. It turns out that flapping—like water striding—not only involves creating a vortex to create force but also requires complex flexing and relaxing of a flying creature's body to generate areas of high and low pressure.
The U of T researchers envision their research as leading to flocks of "small, lightweight robots hovering over Martian land rovers and guiding them to places of interest." (Thanks to Robots.net for the link).