RI: Bacteria Assisted Propulsion of Swimming Micro-Robots

本课题研究细菌辅助的(生物/非生物)混合型游泳微机器人作为一种新型的微机器人驱动方法。一个无机微型机器人身体是由附着在其上的细菌等微生物的螺旋鞭毛推动的。原核生物细菌将通过开关速度控制来健壮而高效地推进微型机器人的身体。通过向细菌提供和控制所需的生化能源和环境条件，将从细菌获得动力、动力源和驱动。这项工作的研究突破是将自然界中已有的纳米机器(即鞭毛)与微尺度机器人实体耦合。这项工作将为微型游泳机器人开发这种新的驱动原理和设计方法，从而推动微型机器人领域的发展。此外，我们对生物和非生物物体相互作用的理解将得到改善。提出了三个研究目标：1)将细菌集成到无机微型机器人体内；2)开关机器人推进速度控制；3)鞭毛推进建模与表征。该项目中高度跨学科的研究工作将被转移到许多机器人和工程方面的教育活动中。它将支持从女性学生和代表不足的少数族裔中挑选的研究生，并将培训代表不足的少数族裔本科生。

This project investigates bacteria assisted propulsion of a hybrid (biotic/abiotic) swimming micro-robot as a novel micro-robot actuation approach. An inorganic micro-robot body is propelled by the helical flagella of microorganisms such as bacteria attached to it. Prokaryotic bacteria will propel a micro-robot body robustly and efficiently with on/off speed control. The motility power source and actuation will be harvested from the bacteria by supplying and controlling the required biochemical energy source and environmental conditions to them. The research breakthrough of this work is the coupling of the nanoscale machine already in nature (i.e., the flagella) to microscale robotic bodies. This work would advance the micro-robotics field by developing this new actuation principle and design methodology for micro-scale swimming robots. Moreover, our understanding of biotic and abiotic object interactions would be improved. Three research objectives are proposed: 1) Integration of bacteria to an inorganic micro-robot body; 2) On/off robot propulsion speed control; 3) Modeling and characterization of flagellar propulsion. Highly interdisciplinary research work in this project would be transferred to many educational activities in robotics and engineering. It would support graduate students whom would be chosen from female students and underrepresented minorities, and underrepresented minority undergraduate students would be trained.