Robobees

Busier than robotic dogs, or even so-called robotic vacuums, a colony of robotic bees is being built at Harvard University thanks to a $9.3-million grant from the stimulus bill. The goal? No honey-making here, but the results might be even sweeter—scientifically speaking. The team, led by Robert Wood, an assistant professor of electrical engineering at Harvard’s Microrobotics Laboratory, aims to create “a colony of autonomous, microscale flapping-wing robots,” the researchers explained in an e-mail.

Their self-proclaimed “lofty goal” involves engineering and computing problems from flight dynamics to electronic brains and social interactions. Although their materials and techniques are decidedly man-made, “nature is our inspiration,” they noted.

In the long run, the researchers hope that the project will create more than just a hive of “robobees” as they are known. They propose that the problems that they will have to solve along the way will add insight to everything from search-and-rescue missions to traffic monitoring.

The project will continue buzzing along until mid-2014, and the research is already being taken into local high school classrooms to “inspire students to go into engineering and computer science.”
(http://www.scientificamerican.com)