A self-organizing robotic aggregate using solid and liquid-like collective states

Robotic Microcapsule Assemblies with Adaptive Mobility for Targeted Treatment of Rugged Biological Microenvironments

Microrobots are poised to transform biomedicine by enabling precise, noninvasive procedures. However, current magnetic microrobots, composed of solid monolithic particles, present fundamental challenges in engineering intersubunit interactions, limiting their collective effectiveness in navigating irregular biological terrains and confined spaces. To address this, we design hierarchically assembled microrobots with multiaxis mobility and collective adaptability by engineering the potential magnetic interaction energy between subunits to create stable, self-reconfigurable structures capable of carrying and protecting cargo internally. Using double emulsion templates and magnetic control techniques, we confine 10 nm iron oxide and 15 nm silica nanoparticles within the shell of 100 μm microcapsules that form multiunit robotic collectives. Unexpectedly, we find that asymmetric localization of iron oxide nanoparticles in the microcapsules enhances the intercapsule potential energy, creating stable connections under rotating magnetic fields without altering the magnetic susceptibility. These robotic microcapsule collectives exhibit emergent behaviors, self-reconfiguring into kinematic chain-like structures to traverse complex obstacles, arched confinements, and adhesive, rugged biological tissues that typically impede microscale systems. By harnessing these functions, we demonstrate targeted antifungal delivery using a localized biofilm model on mucosal tissues, showing effective killing ofCandida without binding or causing physical damage to host cells. Our findings show how hierarchical assembly can produce cargo-carrying microrobots with collective, self-adaptive mobility for traversing complex biological environments, advancing targeted delivery for biomedical applications.

Robo-Matter towards reconfigurable multifunctional smart materials

Maximizing materials utilization efficiency via enhancing their reconfigurability and multifunctionality offers a promising avenue in addressing the global challenges in sustainability. To this end, significant efforts have been made in developing reconfigurable multifunctional smart materials, which can exhibit remarkable behaviors such as morphing and self-healing. However, the difficulty in efficiently manipulating and controlling matter at the building block level with manageable cost and complexity, which is crucial to achieving superior responsiveness to environmental clues and stimuli, has significantly hindered the further development of such smart materials. Here we introduce a concept of Robo-Matter, which can be activated and controlled through external information exchange at the building block level, to enable a high-level of controllability, mutability and versatility for reconfigurable multifunctional smart materials. Using specially designed micro-robot building blocks with symmetry-breaking active motion modes, tunable anisotropic interactions, and interactive coupling with a programmable spatial-temporal dynamic light field, we demonstrate an emergent Robot-Matter duality, which enables a spectrum of desirable behaviors spanning from matter-like properties such as ultra-fast self-assembly and adaptivity, to robot-like properties including active force output, smart healing, smart morphing and infiltration. Our work demonstrates a promising direction for designing next-generation smart materials and large-scale robotic swarms.

Miniature Modular Reconfigurable Underwater Robot Based on Synthetic Jet

Modular reconfigurable robots exhibit prominent advantages in the reconnaissance and exploration tasks within unstructured environments for their characteristics of high adaptability and high robustness. However, due to the limitations in locomotion mechanism and integration requirements, the modular design of miniature robots in the aquatic environment encounters significant challenges. Here, a modular strategy based on the synthetic jet principle is proposed, and a modular reconfigurable robot system is developed. Specialized bottom and side jet actuators are designed with vibration motors as excitation sources, and a motion module is developed incorporating the jet actuators to realize three-dimensional agile motion. Its linear, rotational, and ascending motion speeds reach 70.7 mm s-1, 3.3 rad s-1, and 28.7 mm s-1, respectively. The module integrates the power supply, communication, and control system with a small size of 48 mm × 38 mm × 38 mm, which ensures a wireless controllable motion. Then, various configurations of the multi-module robot system are established with corresponding motion schemes, and the experiments with replaceable intermediate modules are further conducted to verify the transportation and image-capturing functions. This work demonstrates the effectiveness of synthetic jet propulsion for aquatic modular reconfigurable robot systems, and it exhibits profound potential in future underwater applications.

Robot swarms meet soft matter physics

Principles of soft matter physics can be leveraged to develop swarms of active robots with unique properties.