Collaborative Research: A Combustion-Powered, Flapping-Wing Micro Air Vehicle

合作研究：燃烧动力扑翼微型飞行器

• 批准号: 1537715
• 负责人: Robert Wood
• 金额: $ 22.58万
• 依托单位: Harvard University
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 项目类别: Standard Grant
• 财政年份: 2015
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 2015-11-01 至 2018-10-31
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward?AWD_ID=1537715&HistoricalAwards=false
• 关键词: Collaborative; Research; Combustion; Powered; Flapping

This project will demonstrate an insect-sized flying robot powered by combustion, with a hard exoskeleton and integrated soft actuators. The premise is that structure, propulsion, snd control inspired by the insect musculoskeletal system will produce more efficient and robust microrobots. The analogy becomes even more clear with the realization that, like most animals, insects chemically burn glucose (a hydrocarbon) for muscle actuation. Conservative estimates suggest that the use of combustion to power flying microrobots will allow untethered and autonomous operation for greater than 30 minutes in idealized conditions, enabling vastly more effective application to search and rescue, inspection of infrastructure, and distributed sensor networks. In addition, this project will have broad impacts in education, harnessing children's natural interest in insect biology towards a STEM outcome of understanding robotics.The combustion of hydrocarbons can have up to fifty times the volumetric energy density of lithium polymer batteries and is a potential power source for untethered robots, even at the scale of insects. This research is to show how combustion-powered actuation of a soft, artificial muscle can generate sufficiently high frequencies and forces to power flapping-wing micro-aerial vehicles. Typical combustion-powered machines require heavy and complex transmission systems to effectively use chemical energy. Instead, this research will develop soft, elastomeric bladders that expand during combustion, and serve as both engine and transmission -- drastically reducing complexity and weight. Flying robots are the target application for this project due to the extreme energetic demands of flight at small scales but the results will be broadly applicable to other power-demanding autonomous systems. Furthermore, the small scale of the envisioned robot will produce innovations in multi-scale multi-material manufacturing. The work will take place in three tasks: (i) fabrication and testing of a microscale soft engine; (ii) integration of the combustion chamber with a flapping-wing robot platform; (iii) development of additional technologies required for autonomous flight and performing tethered controlled flight experiments.

该项目将展示一个由燃烧动力的昆虫大小的飞行机器人，具有硬骨骼和集成的软执行器。前提是，受昆虫肌肉骨骼系统启发的结构，推进，SND控制将产生更有效和稳健的微型机器人。随着大多数动物与大多数动物的化学燃烧葡萄糖（一种碳氢化合物）进行肌肉致动，这种比喻变得更加清楚。保守的估计表明，在理想化的条件下，使用燃烧为飞行微型机器人供电超过30分钟，可以使搜索和救援，检查基础设施的检查和分布式传感器网络更加有效。此外，该项目将对教育产生广泛的影响，将儿童对昆虫生物学的自然兴趣带入理解机器人的茎结果。碳氢化合物的燃烧最多可以是锂聚合物电池的体积能量密度的五十倍，并且是未经果实机器人的潜在动力源，即使在昆虫的规模上也是如此。这项研究是为了表明，柔软，人造肌肉的燃烧动力如何产生足够高的频率和力量，以供电吹翼的微型赛车。典型的燃烧机需要重大且复杂的传输系统才能有效使用化学能。取而代之的是，这项研究将开发出柔软的弹性膀胱，这些膀胱在燃烧过程中扩展，并充当发动机和传输 - 大大降低了复杂性和重量。飞行机器人是该项目的目标应用程序，因为在小规模上飞行的极端能量需求，但结果将广泛适用于其他按需要求的自主系统。此外，设想的机器人的小规模将在多尺度多材料制造中产生创新。这项工作将在三个任务中进行：（i）微观发动机的制造和测试； （ii）将燃烧室与拍打机器人平台的集成； （iii）开发自动飞行所需的其他技术和进行束缚的受控飞行实验。