A new generation of miniature biological robots is flexing its muscle.
Engineers at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign demonstrated a class of walking “bio-bots” powered by muscle cells and controlled with electrical pulses, giving researchers unprecedented command over their function. The group published its work in the online early edition of Proceedings of the National Academy of Science.
“Biological actuation driven by cells is a fundamental need for any kind of biological machine you want to build,” said study leaderRashid Bashir, Abel Bliss Professor and head of bioengineering at the U. of I. “We’re trying to integrate these principles of engineering with biology in a way that can be used to design and develop biological machines and systems for environmental and medical applications. Biology is tremendously powerful, and if we can somehow learn to harness its advantages for useful applications, it could bring about a lot of great things.”
“It’s only natural that we would start from a bio-mimetic design principle, such as the native organization of the musculoskeletal system, as a jumping-off point,” said graduate student Caroline Cvetkovic, co-first author of the paper. “This work represents an important first step in the development and control of biological machines that can be stimulated, trained, or programmed to do work. It’s exciting to think that this system could eventually evolve into a generation of biological machines that could aid in drug delivery, surgical robotics, ‘smart’ implants, or mobile environmental analyzers, among countless other applications.”
Read more . . .
The Latest on: Biological robots
[google_news title=”” keyword=”Biological robots” num_posts=”10″ blurb_length=”0″ show_thumb=”left”]
via Google News
The Latest on: Biological robots
- Robots cannot outrun animals, but they're evolving fasteron April 26, 2024 at 11:30 am
Despite these efforts, today's robots still cannot match the natural abilities of many animals in terms of endurance ...
- Automated machine learning robot unlocks new potential for genetics researchon April 26, 2024 at 9:10 am
University of Minnesota Twin Cities researchers have constructed a robot that uses machine learning to fully automate a complicated microinjection process used in genetic research.
- Sanctuary AI CEO - the robots really are coming! Thanks to transformer AIon April 26, 2024 at 6:44 am
Robotics is really about ‘embodied AI’, says the CEO of Sanctuary AI, whose vision of robots’ future is now close to the one predicted by sci-fi. Meanwhile: the real transformers are… us.
- Robots can walk worse than animals – despite technical superiorityon April 25, 2024 at 12:42 pm
Robots with legs can sometimes walk more, sometimes less well. But they never come close to the performance of animals. Why is that?
- Why can't robots outrun animals?on April 24, 2024 at 11:00 am
Robotics engineers have worked for decades and invested many millions of research dollars in attempts to create a robot that can walk or run as well as an animal. And yet, it remains the case that ...
- Evolution vs. Engineering: Why Can’t Robots Outrun Animals?on April 24, 2024 at 11:00 am
Despite superior individual components, robots lag behind animals in overall performance, suggesting a future focus on better system integration and control in robotics. Robotics engineers have worked ...
- Why animals run faster than their robot doppelgängers… for nowon April 24, 2024 at 11:00 am
“It [advances in robots] will move faster, because evolution is undirected,” University of Washington Department of Electrical & Computer Engineering Associate Professor Sam Burden said. “There are ...
- Endangered species are dying out on Earth. Could they be saved in outer space?on April 22, 2024 at 8:00 pm
A process called cryopreservation allows cells to remain frozen but alive for hundreds of years. For some animal cells, the moon is the closest place that's cold enough.
- Mathematicians Gave a Billiard Ball a Brain—and It Led to Something Unbelievableon April 22, 2024 at 6:30 am
Mathematicians from the University of Amsterdam ran an experiment where a frictionless billiard ball was given spatial memory, meaning it never crossed its own path twice. After running the simulation ...
- What robot makers can learn from an octopuson April 21, 2024 at 5:13 am
Researchers show how they were able to create a multi-layer soft structure and an artificial fluidic system to mimic the musculature and mucus structures of biological suckers.
via Bing News