Prof. Sarah Bergbreiter
Department of Mechanical Engineering, Univeristy of Maryland
BSAC PhD 2007
September 27, 2011 | 12:00 to 01:00 | 540 Cory Hall, DOP Center Conference Room
Host: Kris Pister
Research on mobile microrobots has been ongoing for the last 20 years, but the few robots that have walked have done so at slow speeds on smooth silicon wafers. However, ants can move at speeds over 40 body lengths/s on surfaces from picnic tables to front lawns. What challenges do we still need to tackle for microrobots to achieve this incredible mobility? This talk will discuss some of the mechanisms and motors we have designed and fabricated to enable robot mobility at the insect-size scale. Mechanisms utilize new microfabrication processes to incorporate materials with widely varying moduli and functionality for more complexity in smaller packages. Actuators are designed to provide significant improvements in force density, efficiency, and robustness over previous microactuators. Results include a 4mm jumping mechanism that can be launched approximately 35 cm straight up as well as a 300mg robot that jumps 8 cm with on-board power, sensing, actuation, and control.
http://terpconnect.umd.edu/~sarahb
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