NRI: Small: Magnetic Mobile Micro-Robotic Swarms using Smart Magnetic Composites

该奖项的研究目标是为特定应用开发大量磁性移动的微型机器人的建模、设计和控制方法。在这里，微型机器人被提出由新型智能磁性复合材料制成，用于在诸如人体内部、微流控芯片和小型桌面机器人等小的受限空间中在二维和三维中进行远程、并行磁致动和控制。该研究将产生足够通用的方法，适用于所有磁性微型机器人系统，并可用于各种应用。这些成果包括基本建模、分析、设计和制造工具的目录，通过硬件进行演示和验证，研究结果的文档记录，以及工程专业学生的教育。如果成功，这项研究的结果将提供一个机会，创造新的微型机器人系统，用于医疗保健、微流体生物设备、组织工程、可编程物质和桌面微型制造应用。研究结果将予以传播，以便能够创造用于医疗、生物工程和微型制造应用的商业微型机器人装置。研究生和本科工程专业的学生将受益于课堂教学和参与研究。该项目的研究成果将通过公开讲座向儿童，K-12学生，K-12教师，IEEE学生成员和大学生展示。该项目的成果还将在科学博物馆展出，以教育公众和儿童了解微型机器人技术。

The research objective of this award is to develop methods for modeling, design and control of a large number of magnetic mobile micro-robots for a given specific application. Here, micro-robots are proposed to be made of novel smart magnetic composites for remote, parallel magnetic actuation and control in two dimensions and three dimensions in small confined spaces such as inside the human body, a micro-fluidic chip, and small desktop workspaces. The research will result in methods which are general enough to apply across all magnetic micro-robotic systems and that can be exploited in diverse applications. Deliverables include a catalog of fundamental modeling, analysis, design and fabrication tools, demonstration and validation via hardware, documentation of research results, and engineering student education.If successful, the results of this research will provide an opportunity to create new micro-robotic systems for use in health-care, microfluidic bio-devices, tissue engineering, programmable matter, and desktop micro-manufacturing applications. The results will be disseminated to allow the creation of commercial micro-robotic devices for medical, bioengineering and micro-manufacturing applications. Graduate and undergraduate engineering students will benefit through classroom instruction and involvement in the research. The research results of the project will be presented to children, K-12 students, K-12 teachers, IEEE student members, and college students through public lectures. The achievements of the project will be also exhibited in science museums for educating the public and children on micro-robotics.