Researchers Build World's Smallest Mobile Robot

Dartmouth University researchers have created the world's smallest untethered, controllable robot. Their extremely tiny machine is about as wide as a strand of human hair, and half the length of the period at the end of this sentence. About 200 of these could march in a line across the top of a plain M&M.

The microrobot is untethered and controllable. About 200 of these could march in a line across the top of a plain M&M. (Courtesy Donald Laboratory)

The future applications for microelectromechanical systems (MEMS) include ensuring information security, such as assisting with network authentication and authorization; inspecting and making repairs to an integrated circuit; exploring hazardous environments, perhaps after a hazardous chemical explosion; or involving biotechnology, say to manipulate cells or tissues.

The machine integrates power delivery, locomotion, communication, and a controllable steering system – the combination of which has never been achieved before in a machine this small. Donald explains that this discovery ushers in a new generation of even tinier microrobots.

The prototype is steerable and untethered, meaning that it can move freely on a surface without the wires or rails that constrained the motion of previously developed microrobots. Donald explains that this is the smallest robot that transduces force, is untethered, and is engaged in its own locomotion. The robot contains two independent microactuators, one for forward motion and one for turning. It's not pre-programmed to move; it is teleoperated, powered by the grid of electrodes it walks on. The charge in the electrodes not only provides power, it also supplies the robot's instructions that allow it to move freely over the electrodes, unattached to them.

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