Contents
17 June 2020
Vol 5, Issue 43
Vol 5, Issue 43
Focus
- Repurposing factories with robotics in the face of COVID-19
Can collaborative robots ramp up the production of medical ventilators?
- Immune evasion by designer microrobots
Recent work is unveiling the interactions between magnetic microswimmers and cells of the immune system.
- Drones against vector-borne diseases
Uncrewed aerial vehicles can reduce the cost of preventative measures against vector-borne diseases.
- Transforming platelets into microrobots
Biocompatible cell robots powered by urea improve drug delivery through active movement.
Research Articles
- Elucidating the interaction dynamics between microswimmer body and immune system for medical microrobots
Morphology-dependent immunogenicity obliges a compromise on the locomotion-focused design of medical microrobots.
- Field performance of sterile male mosquitoes released from an uncrewed aerial vehicle
An automatic adult mosquito release device operated from a drone released sterile males without reducing their quality.
- Automatic tracking of free-flying insects using a cable-driven robot
The free flight of insects is studied using a lab-on-cables with a reactive controller that minimizes tracking errors.
- Enzyme-powered Janus platelet cell robots for active and targeted drug delivery
Drug-loaded urease-powered Janus cell robots enhance binding efficiency with biological targets and improve therapeutic efficacy.
About The Cover
ONLINE COVER Lab on Wires. Understanding how insects fly may inspire future developments in micro-aerial robotics. However, studying the free-flight of insects can be challenging due to their high speed of motion and small size. Furthermore, existing approaches to study insect flight can cause the insect to fly unnaturally, thus limiting any insight gained. Pannequin et al. track the free-flight of insects in natural conditions with limited disturbance using a cable robot called "lab-on-cables." The cable robot is an open cage mounted with cameras. The cage, attached to cables, moves automatically with the flying insect to track the insect's flight. This month's cover is a photograph of the lab-on-cables. [CREDIT: D. MARTINEZ]
