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Robotics Technology

Diodes Could Drive Swimming Micro-Robots 51

Posted by CowboyNeal from the robot-parade dept.
finisterre writes "Diodes can be made to 'swim' through salt water by hitting them with an alternating electric field. The applied field induces a current that sets up a field between the diode's electrical contacts and creates a propulsive force. The abstract of the paper in Nature Materials is freely available. New Scientist has videos of the swimming diodes in action."
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Diodes Could Drive Swimming Micro-Robots More

Diodes Could Drive Swimming Micro-Robots

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  • Uhhh (Score:3, Funny)

    by malkir ( 1031750 ) on Friday March 16, 2007 @04:11AM (#18372299)
    I for one welcome our robotic sperm overlords.

    • Re: (Score:2, Funny)

      by dintech ( 998802 )
      No robosperm for me thank you. Because hitting them with an alternating electric field sounds like quite a painful thing to do to yourself. :P

      Then again, if implemented properly it does open a whole new realm of two-handed typing...
    • Eh? Malkir doesn't sound like a Japanese name.

  • Reading this before properly waking up... (Score:4, Funny)

    by ricky-road-flats ( 770129 ) on Friday March 16, 2007 @04:19AM (#18372323) Homepage
    ... I read dildoes instead of diodes, and I can't even think of a joke for it.

    That's what I get for hitting Slashdot before the first morning coffee. Once I have that buzz I might be able to think of a punchline.

  • leave your taser at home (Score:4, Funny)

    by User 956 ( 568564 ) on Friday March 16, 2007 @04:30AM (#18372373) Homepage
    Diodes can be made to 'swim' through salt water by hitting them with an alternating electric field.

    And yet for some reason this same method doesn't work so well on people.

    • Re: (Score:3, Funny)

      by Shemmie ( 909181 )
      That's not true. I connected my local swimming pool to the mains voltage to test the theory - after that, they all floated.
    • And yet for some reason this same method doesn't work so well on people.

      Are you sure? Have you tried it out? This is science man and it requires exhaustive testing. Take your taser to a pool and let us know the results.

    • You just aren't applying enough current...

      No but seriously, you can make muscles twitch a'plenty with the application of electricity, we did it on dead frog legs back in the school once. Try it on your favorite dead-frog/spouse/roommate of choice

  • Voltage? (Score:2, Interesting)

    by AmIAnAi ( 975049 )
    Anyone know what voltage was used here. Personally, I don't fancy being hooked up to the AC to drive nano-scale surgical robots round my body.

    • Re: (Score:3, Informative)

      by Bromskloss ( 750445 )

      Anyone know what voltage was used here.

      They used an electric field of 3000 V/m to 15000 V/m. Using the distances they said they had between the electrodes, it seems that for these particular experiments, the voltage was in the range of 75 V to 1050 V.

    • Re: (Score:1)

      by tenco ( 773732 )
      You don't need to be hooked up to AC to have an AC electric field applied to you. Just stand between the plates of a big enough capacitor.

  • Toy + Publicity Stunt (Score:2, Interesting)

    by Bender_ ( 179208 )

    That is all there is. The propulsion principle has been known for at least a hundred years. The only 'new' thing is to use a diode to generate a DC field from externally applied AC. But actually that does not really solve any practical problem.
  • Ok very nice, but is there a use?

    I see something I am quite familiar with in scientific papers, lots of complex ways to say simple things to disguise the fact that they haven't the feintest idea what this can really be used for.

    Take the nuggets:
    "microfluidic channels"
    "global external field"
    "decoupling of the velocity of the particles"

    All appearing in the abstract, with a definite avoidance of plain English.

    I mean, wtf is that all about? I see not a single practical application mentioned with a decent justif

    • Re: (Score:3, Interesting)

      by ArsenneLupin ( 766289 )

      I see not a single practical application mentioned with adecent justification for that application being superior or equivalent to some other method.

      Actually, they did mention one application: medical microrobots. And they mentioned why their method might be superior to other methods (such as a micromotor driving a ship-screw):

      But extrapolations of the team's measurements indicate the propulsive force will work just as well at smaller scales. "The propulsive force scales in exactly the same way as the drag. That's quite significant," says McKinley.

      ==> drag would be a problem for other methods, but not for this one.

      • I got that, but there was, so far as I could see, no evidence of an attempt at practical aplication, just speculation.

        It may well be fabulous, but it seems to me they have this interesting thing, but no evidence of it actually working on application to a problem
        • Too bad your ancestors didn't die out when they said the same thing about the discovery of fire...
          • I seriously doubt that someone discovered fire then tried to find a use for it.

            More likely they encountered fire and noted its effects, initially that predators were afraid of it, and it evolved from there.

            Early humans had no free time for abstract thought, a thing was either immediately useful or it wasn't utilised.

            Abstraction, and research (of a kind) did not occur until man had found ways to domesticate animals and obtain more reliable food sources. Once the daily need to hunt all day was gone, things go
    • There is a reason that the words "science" and "technology" refer to two different concepts. One pertains to a method used to discover properties of the world around us and the other refers to using those properties to do interesting things.

      Was Hans Christian Ørsted doing bad science when he discovered the relationship between electricity and magnetism? Should he have waited until he himself discovered the basic laws of electromagnetism? Or is that not enough either? Should he have come up with the ele
  • The first linked article has some discussion of using this technology inside the human body. I can envision the power source being provided by something like an MRI machine... person lays on the table and is moved inside the field that would power the "bots".

    If they can overcome the issues mentioned and make the machines small enough, there are a wide range of uses that I can think of. Treating individual cancerous cells instead of bombarding the entire body with kemo immediately comes to mind!
  • Cover the outside of a sub with them and get stealth propulsion.
    • Navy has it. USA, Russians. You just don't hear about it. Magnetohydrodynamic propulsion and very noiseless. You run current through seawater in a magnetic field and get a propulsive flow. However, with seawater the electrodes tend to get eaten away unless they have platinum surfaces. Platinum is $1200 an ounce but the technology is usable. Now that I've told you, I'll have to shoot you.

      • Re: (Score:3, Informative)

        by KokorHekkus ( 986906 )
        Not just US and russian navy but also Mitsubishi. They built the experimental boat Yamato 1 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yamato_1 [wikipedia.org]. Just wanted to give you a heads up before you shoot anyone for no reason you know ;-)
        • Um, as a matter of practice, I never shoot anyone for no reason, taking my cue from Kirth Gerson; he's dedicated to the point of obsession but logical enough about these matters. I'd heard of, but neglected to mention, the Japanese, thanks on this.

    • Re: (Score:1, Funny)

      by Anonymous Coward
      mmmm....a submarine covered in LEDs.

      Would look pretty cool, but I doubt it would be very stealthy.

      Plus you'd get giant squid attracted by the light trying to mate with the sub.....messy

  • Swimming with Diodes. (Score:3, Funny)

    by fahrbot-bot ( 874524 ) on Friday March 16, 2007 @07:40AM (#18373051)
    "Diodes can be made to 'swim' through salt water by hitting them with an alternating electric field.

    Now if they can mount freakin' LASERs on them as well...

    • from the article "These rudimentary self-propelling devices can emit light or respond to light and could be controlled by internal logic." I think using laser diodes would emit lasers, and kill two birds with one stone,

    • Re: (Score:1)

      by PPH ( 736903 )
      I, for one, welcome our laser armed, diode propelled robotic shark overlords.
  • Remember the hunt for Red October and it's super silent caterpillar drive with no moving parts?
  • Caterpillar drives for submarines?

    Easily detectable (by their electromagnetic signature), but fast and quiet - no moving parts.

  • Now they'll just tell me I need to go for a swim.
    I don't think they'll *ever* get around to fixing this terrible pain in all the diodes down my left hand side.

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