Flying Robotic Insects Get Multi-Stage Micro Rockets

Microrobots in flight are in itself a challenging new concept. But the researchers developing them are facing an greater challenge with regards to the sustained flight of these micro robotic insects becauseÂ common power sourcesÂ have low energy density. Thus, a team of researchers from Micro Robotics Laboratory of the Harvard University has come up withÂ solid rocket fuel powered micro thrusters. With a multi stage configuration these thrusters can be used for intermittent flight.

That's not it. The researchers have presented a take-off trajectory of a 10cm rocket glider with an integrated micro thruster as propulsion mechanism showing that the technologies developed can be used to successfully power micro robots in flight.

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The researchers have concluded that the most promising actuation method for robotic insects is the solid rocket propulsion.Â We are already looking at use of robotics insects at mobile distributed sensor networks, assisted agriculture, hazardous environment exploration, and search and rescue. Have a look at the video from the team -

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You can take a look at the paper <a href="https://www.roboticsproceedings.org/rss08/p24.pdf" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">PDF</a>.

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