Scientists at the University of Pennsylvania (USA) have just announced a breakthrough achievement with the world's smallest autonomous robot.
With a size of only about 0.2 x 0.3 x 0.05 mm (equivalent to many microorganisms), these robots are almost invisible to the naked eye but possess incredible independent performance.
Despite their super-small size, each robot can still feel the surrounding environment, move through complex models and operate continuously for many months.
Notably, the production cost of each robot is only about one US penny (1 cent), opening the possibility of large deployment in the future.
This achievement is the result of a combination of two technical breakthroughs. The push-ups, which help robots move, were developed at the University of Pennsylvania, while the energy-saving super-computing brain was studied by the University of Michigan.
Thanks to that, the robot can swim in liquid environments, react to temperature changes and even coordinate movements in groups, similar to a flock of fish.
According to Marc Miskin, assistant professor of electrical and systems engineering at the University of Pennsylvania, reducing autonomous robots to a scale 10,000 times smaller than before will open a completely new era for programming machines.
We are starting to see what autonomous intelligence looks like at the micro level, Miskin said.
One of the biggest challenges in building micro robots is the problem of mobility. At a micro-scale, water no longer acts like a regular liquid but like thick plastic, making it extremely difficult to swim or push.
To solve this problem, the researchers designed the movement mechanism by affecting the environment around the robot.
By creating an electric field, the robot pushes ions in the liquid, thereby pulling water molecules and creating movement forward.
Due to the lack of moving mechanical parts, the robot is durable and can operate continuously for a long time.
To operate artificial intelligence on such a small scale, the research team at the University of Michigan has developed a microchip that consumes only about 75 nanowatts of electricity, much less than current smart wearables.
Most of the robot's surface is covered with solar panels, allowing for power supply and programming through light pulses.
Control instructions are positioned at maximum, helping the robot perform complex movements with just a specialized command.
Each robot also has its own identification code, allowing different tasks to be assigned in the same group.
Equipped with a temperature sensor with an accuracy of about ±0.33 degrees Celsius, the robot can move towards warmer areas or detect temperature changes, an important mark of cell activity. They convey information through shaking movements.
Although still in the early stages, scientists believe that this generation of micro-robots can lay the foundation for many future breakthrough applications, from cell-level health monitoring, supporting the assembly of micro-device to opening a new era of the smallest-scale smart robot ever imagined.
