Using electricity and water, a new kind of motor can slide microrobots into motion

[JacksinPA]

Using electricity and water, a new kind of motor can slide microrobots into motion | MIT News

Microhydraulic actuators, thinner than one-third the width of human hair, are proving to be the most powerful and efficient motors at the microscale.

Look around and you'll likely see something that runs on an electric motor. Powerful and efficient, they keep much of our world moving, everything from our computers to refrigerators to the automatic windows in our cars. But these qualities change for the worse when such motors are shrunk down to sizes smaller than a cubic centimeter.

"At very small scales, you get a heater instead of a motor," said Jakub Kedzierski, staff in MIT Lincoln Laboratory's Chemical, Microsystem, and Nanoscale Technologies Group. Today, no motor exists that is both highly efficient and powerful at microsizes. And that’s a problem, because motors on that scale are needed to put miniaturized systems into motion — microgimbals that can point lasers to a fraction of a degree over thousands of miles, tiny drones that can squeeze into wreckage to find survivors, or even bots that can crawl through the human digestive tract.
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MIT is developing a new type of motor called a micohydraulic actuator.

'The actuators move with a level of precision, efficiency, and power that has not yet been possible at the microscale.'

More incredible stuff from MIT.

 

[longview]

Using electricity and water, a new kind of motor can slide microrobots into motion | MIT News

Microhydraulic actuators, thinner than one-third the width of human hair, are proving to be the most powerful and efficient motors at the microscale.

Look around and you'll likely see something that runs on an electric motor. Powerful and efficient, they keep much of our world moving, everything from our computers to refrigerators to the automatic windows in our cars. But these qualities change for the worse when such motors are shrunk down to sizes smaller than a cubic centimeter.

"At very small scales, you get a heater instead of a motor," said Jakub Kedzierski, staff in MIT Lincoln Laboratory's Chemical, Microsystem, and Nanoscale Technologies Group. Today, no motor exists that is both highly efficient and powerful at microsizes. And that’s a problem, because motors on that scale are needed to put miniaturized systems into motion — microgimbals that can point lasers to a fraction of a degree over thousands of miles, tiny drones that can squeeze into wreckage to find survivors, or even bots that can crawl through the human digestive tract.
==========================

MIT is developing a new type of motor called a micohydraulic actuator.

'The actuators move with a level of precision, efficiency, and power that has not yet been possible at the microscale.'

More incredible stuff from MIT.

That is cool, some clever person will figure out a use for this.

 

[JacksinPA]

The future is nanotechnology & you will need this kind of motive power.

Reminds me of the tremendous R&D effort that went into an area called fluidics in the 1970s. I don't think it went anywhere practical because you could do the same things with electronic components.

 

[DaveFagan]

The future is nanotechnology & you will need this kind of motive power.

Reminds me of the tremendous R&D effort that went into an area called fluidics in the 1970s. I don't think it went anywhere practical because you could do the same things with electronic components.

Electronic logic circuits don't work in intensely radioactive areas. I had recommemded to Senior Personnel at Hanford to use Fluidic logic contol 100% hydraulic or pneumatic. I don't know if they followed through on the advice or not. I'm just pointing to an area of superiority for fluid logic.
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[JacksinPA]

Electronic logic circuits don't work in intensely radioactive areas. I had recommemded to Senior Personnel at Hanford to use Fluidic logic contol 100% hydraulic or pneumatic. I don't know if they followed through on the advice or not. I'm just pointing to an area of superiority for fluid logic.
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Very good observation.

I recently purchased a book of pix of the various facilities remaining at Hanford. Incredible project. They built the canyon building where all the separation chemistry was done before the final process had been worked out. Gen. Groves was a real pusher when it came to getting tings done.