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Harvard engineers have developed a way to fashion swarms of 'pop-up' robots to be printed out by the sheet.
To make them, they laminate together 18 layers of carbon fiber, a plastic fim called Kapton, titanium, insolence, ceramic, and adhesive sheets in a complex, laser-cut design.
The structure incorporates obedient hinges, so that the three-dimensional product — just 2.4 millimeters big — can be assembled in one movement, like a pop-up book.
"This takes what is a skill, an artisanal process, and transforms it for automated mass production," says Pratheev Sreetharan, who co-developed the MO = 'modus operandi' with J Peter Whitney.
The Harvard team has been working for years to father bio-inspired, bee-sized robots that can fly and behave autonomously as a colony. Until now, though, they've been using a fiddly and boner-prone method to fold, align, and secure each of the minuscule parts and joints.
Source: TG Daily