To make a drone like a remora, first the researchers had to observe the real fish. They used a camera to track a remora as it attached to the sides of an aquarium, and they saw that the suction disc could still hold on to the aquarium wall even if some parts of it were not in contact with the surface. They also used micro-computed tomography to scan the head of a remora and look at the different bony and soft tissue structures inside the disc.
Then, the team used 3D printing to construct an oval prototype disc with a gill-like grid structure that was 87 mm long and 46 mm wide. The prototype had four functional layers, a soft layer mimicking the connective tissue, a main disc mimicking the gilly membranes, and fluid-controlled channels that act as a motor for rotating the membrane as well as erecting and depressing each row in the membrane. There’s also another fluid-controlled motor that’s used for bending the disc.
The team then made a hybrid aerial-aquatic robot to which they added the remora-like disc. On the modified quadcopter robot, the disc was accompanied by two motor components, including the hydraulic systems that pump fluid to manipulate the membrane and bend the disc, and a cable system that curls the disc lip to detach. The control system on the robot itself includes a flight control module, a speed regulator, a communications system, a remote control, and a battery.
The resulting remora-like robot can attach to flat and curved surfaces, wet or dry. In swimming pool tests, the robot was able to steer to, attach to, and detach from a larger underwater robot. During attachment, the robot can cut power to its propellers and switch to “standby mode,” traveling with its host. In field tests, out in the ocean, the robot can take underwater videos and retrieve submerged objects.
“The robot’s air-water transition consumed 1.9 times the power of hovering in the air. Notably, the robot’s hitchhiking state can reduce power consumption up to 51.7 times and 19.2 times compared with a hovering state,” the paper’s authors wrote. “Such robotic forms may be promising for several open-environment applications, including long-term air and water observations, cross-medium operations, submerged structure inspections, marine life surveys, and iceberg detections.
United States Latest News, United States Headlines
Similar News:You can also read news stories similar to this one that we have collected from other news sources.
Source: njdotcom - 🏆 282. / 63 Read more »
Source: News12 - 🏆 591. / 51 Read more »
Source: mercnews - 🏆 88. / 68 Read more »
Source: ABC7NY - 🏆 592. / 51 Read more »
Source: verge - 🏆 94. / 67 Read more »
Source: engadget - 🏆 276. / 63 Read more »