Untethered Microrobots Driven by kV-Level Capacitive Actuators via Mechanical Electrostatic Inverters

Actuation of Mobile Microbots: A Review

“…Different arrangements of the conductive electrodes enable the design of a variety of electrostatic actuator types and capabilities. [ 120–123 ] Electrostatic actuators are mainly characterized by their ability to store and release energy over time, which can enable exceptional microbot locomotion capabilities such as repeated jumping. [ 11,124 ]…”

“…Different arrangements of the conductive electrodes enable the design of a variety of electrostatic actuator types and capabilities. [120][121][122][123] Electrostatic actuators are mainly characterized by their ability to store and release energy over time, which can enable exceptional microbot locomotion capabilities such as repeated jumping. [11,124] Schindler et al [11] introduced a 90-mg MEMS SOI-based jumping microbot that employs an electrostatic motor for actuation and inchworm springs for energy storage and actuation amplification.…”

“…Size scale of some recently developed microbots categorized by the actuation method. 1) 3D‐printed walking microbot, [ 51 ] 2) flapping wing rotor, [ 37 ] 3) flapping wing jumping robot, [ 12 ] 4) KUBeetle‐S flying robot, [ 47 ] 5) rolling microbot, [ 48 ] 6) flapping‐wing microbot, [ 8 ] 7) aerial Robot, [ 77 ] 8) Bee+ flying robot, [ 68 ] 9) Insect‐scale fast moving robot, [ 4 ] 10) Micro‐bristle‐bot, [ 78 ] 11) soft mobile robot, [ 59 ] 12) HAMR‐JR microbot, [ 71 ] 13) quadrupedal microbot with enhanced base, [ 74 ] 14) T‐phage inspired piezoelectric microrobot, [ 79 ] 15) microminiature three‐legged crawling robot [ 217 ] , 16) MEMS microbot, [ 18 ] 17) MEMS hexapod microbot, [ 3 ] 18) insect‐scale SMAW‐based soft robot, [ 93 ] 19) electrostatic crawling insect, [ 31 ] 20) jumping silicon microbot, [ 11 ] 21) artificial mussel‐based flying microbot, [ 13 ] 22) untethered microrobots driven by kV‐level capacitive actuators, [ 121 ] 23) autonomous untethered microbot, [ 114 ] 24) sperm‐shaped microbots, [ 86 ] 25) inchworm millirobot, [ 119 ] 26) magnetically actuated walking microbot, [ 9 ] 27) 3D flexible robot, [ 32 ] 28) 3D‐printed microswimmer, [ 218 ] 29) SiCN‐based ceramic microbot, [ 26 ] 30) caterpillar‐inspired microbot, [ 172 ] 31) microscopic robot, [ 219 ] 32) nanoparticle‐based magnetic mobile microrobots, [ 91 ] 33) helical microrobot with magnetic nanoparticle retrieval ability, [ 90 ] 34) real‐time 3D optoacoustic tracking of cell‐sized magnetic microbot, [ 220 ] 35) photoactive pollutant removal magnetic microbot, [ 221 ] 36) light‐driven micro‐rotors, [ 185 ] 37) optoelectronic microbot, [ 136 ] 38) acoustically actuated micro‐swimmer, [ 193 ] 39) micro rocket robot, [ 21 ] 40) acoustically powered surface‐slipping mobile microbot, [ …”

A novel electric stimulus-responsive micro-actuator for powerful biomimetic motions

“…These rigid actuators possess high resonant frequencies, large deflection, and significant reaction forces. Piezoelectric actuators, 25 magnetic actuators, 26 and electrostatic actuators 4 are some typical examples of rigid actuators that have shown great ability in the motions of crawling, [27][28][29][30] jumping, 5,[31][32][33] and flying. [34][35][36] However, these actuators are typically limited to centimetre-sized robots, as achieving high energy efficiency with favourable physical scaling becomes a significant challenge as the size of the actuators decreases.…”