Reprogrammable Microscopic Robots

Here we show programmable, autonomous microscopic robots. Each robot integrates sensors, memory, electrochemical actuators for locomotion, solar cells for power, and a microcomputer into a single sub-mm machine. All these parts are built massively in parallel with fully lithographic fabrication. Robots move by generating electrokinetic flows, controlled by the on-board electronics. A user can program the robot by sending instructions via optical signals to an onboard receiver, digitally defining the robot’s behavior without physical changes. When running, the robot uses sensor data and/or data stored in memory for decision making, enabling sense-think-act loops and autonomous behaviors. For instance, we successfully wrote and implemented programs for gradient climbing, sensor value reporting, and gait control. Broadly, these programmable machines lower the barrier to microscopic robotics, allowing users to define and reconfigure a wide range of behaviors with a general-purpose robot too small to see by eye.

 

Supported by NSF grant 2221576. This work was carried out in part at the Singh Center for Nanotechnology, which is supported by the NSF National Nanotechnology Coordinated Infrastructure Program under grant NNCI-2025608. As well as in the Nanofabrication Facility at the University of Delaware.