Increasingly Intelligent Micromachines


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Date

2022-05

Publication Type

Review Article

ETH Bibliography

yes

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Abstract

Intelligent micromachines, with dimensions ranging from a few millimeters down to hundreds of nanometers, areminiature systems capable of performing specific tasks autonomously at small scales. Enhancing the intelligence of micromachines to tackle the uncertainty and variability in complex microenvironments has applications in minimally invasive medicine, bioengineering, water cleaning, analytical chemistry, and more. Over the past decade, significant progress has been made in the construction of intelligent micro-machines, evolving from simple micromachines to soft, compound, reconfigurable, encodable, multifunctional, and integrated micromachines, as well as from individual to multiagent, multiscale, hierarchical, self-organizing, and swarm micromachines. The field leverages two important trends in robotics research-the miniaturization and intelligentization of machines-but a compelling combination of these two features has yet to be realized. The core technologies required to make such tiny machines intelligent include information media, transduction, processing, exchange, and energy supply, but embedding all of these functions into a system at themicro- or nanoscale is challenging. This article offers a comprehensive introduction to the state-of-the-art technologies used to create intelligence for micromachines and provides insight into the construction of next-generation intelligent micro-machines that can adapt to diverse scenarios for use in emerging fields.

Publication status

published

Editor

Book title

Volume

5

Pages / Article No.

279 - 310

Publisher

Annual Reviews

Event

Edition / version

Methods

Software

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Date collected

Date created

Subject

intelligent micromachines; micromachine intelligence; μ-AI; microrobotics; nanorobotics; interactions at small scales; swarm intelligence

Organisational unit

03627 - Nelson, Bradley J. / Nelson, Bradley J. check_circle

Notes

Funding

743217 - Soft Micro Robotics (EC)
165564 - Soft Magnetic Robots: Modeling, Design and Control of Magnetically Guided Continuum Manipulators (SNF)
197017 - Flexible Electronics meets µ-Robotics: Route for Augmented Bio-Intelligent Medical Treatments (SNF)

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