A new study by MIT scientists uncovers how male sandgrouse are able to soak up large amounts of water in their feathers and carry it over long distances to their chicks, reports Forbes. The researchers found that “when wetted, the coiled portions of the sandgrouse feather barbules unwind and rotate so they end up perpendicular to the vane. This creates a dense forest of fibers that can hold water through capillary action.”
MIT engineers have developed a new technique that enables bug-sized aerial robots to handle a sizeable amount of damage and still fly, reports Andrew Paul for Popular Science. “The new repair techniques could come in handy when using flying robots for search-and-rescue missions in difficult environments like dense forests or collapsed buildings,” writes Paul.
Postdoc Zach Patterson speaks with Mashable about how he and his colleagues are developing a soft robot inspired by a sea turtle that could potentially "offer a closer look at ocean life and assist in further studying aquatic creatures.” Patterson explains that the robotic turtle is meant to be a “platform for exploring the interaction between soft and rigid materials incorporated into a robotic structure.”
Researchers at MIT developed SoFi, a soft robotic fish designed to study underwater organisms and their environments, reports Mashable. “The soft robotic fish serves a nice purpose for hopefully minimizing impact on the environments that we’re studying and also helps us study different types of behaviors and also study the actual mechanics of these organisms as well,” says graduate student Levi Cai.
Researchers at MIT have “created a stretchable color-changing material based on how nature often reflects color,” reports Nicole Estaphan for WCVB’s Chronicle. “As you stretch it, these embedded nanostructures change size,” explains graduate student Benjamin Miller, “which in turn changes the color of light that comes back. We are making an elastic, squishy version of the sort of thing you find in nature.”
Researchers at MIT have developed a silk-based biodegradable substitute for microplastics, reports Ysabelle Kempe for Scientific American. “This type of research is urgent for companies that face tightening regulations on deliberate use of microplastics,” writes Kempe.
Washington Post reporter Pranshu Verma spotlights Prof. Kevin Chen’s research creating flying lightning bug robots that could be used to pollinate crops in vertical farms or even in space. “If we think about the insect functions that animals can’t do,” says Chen, “that inspires us to think about what smaller, insect-scale robots can do, that larger robots cannot.”
Fast Company reporter Elissaveta Brandon writes that a team of scientists from MIT and elsewhere have developed an amphibious artificial vision system inspired by the fiddler crab’s compound eye, which has an almost 360-degree field of view and can see on both land and water. “When translated into a machine,” writes Brandon, “this could mean more versatile cameras for self-driving cars and drones, both of which can become untrustworthy in the rain.”
Researchers at MIT have developed a silk-based substitute that could be used to replace microplastics, reports Matthew Rozsa for Salon. Prof. Benedetto Marelli and postodoctoral associate Muchun Liu explain that they have demonstrated that “silk protein can be used as a technological material in agricultural products and cosmetics – it can protect and control the release of active ingredients, and it can be biodegraded.”
TechCrunch reporter Brian Heater spotlights multiple MIT research projects, including MIT Space Exploration Initiative’s TESSERAE, CSAIL’s Robocraft and the recent development of miniature flying robotic drones.
MIT engineers have created insect-sized robots that can emit light when they fly and could eventually be used to aid search-and-rescue missions, reports WHDH. “Our idea is, if we can send in hundreds or thousands of those tiny flying robots then once they find that survivor, they will shine out light and pass information back and signal people on the outside saying ‘we found someone who’s trapped,'” explains Prof. Kevin Chen.
MIT engineers have developed tiny flying robots that can light up, reports Colleen Hagerty for Popular Science. “If you think of large-scale robots, they can communicate using a lot of different tools—Bluetooth, wireless, all those sorts of things,” says Prof. Kevin Chen. “But for a tiny, power-constrained robot, we are forced to think about new modes of communication.”
Using cellulose nanocrystals found in trees, MIT researchers have developed a new material that is both tough and strong, reports Kathryn Hulick for Science News for Students. Abhinav Rao PhD ’18 explains that he was inspired to create the material “by looking at what nature has to teach us.”
MIT scientists have discovered a way to watch and record the development of butterfly scales from the inside of a butterfly’s chrysalis, reports Elizabeth Gamillo for Smithsonian Magazine. “The team plans on further exploring the structure of butterfly wings and the reasoning behind the ridged design,” writes Gamillo.
CNET science writer Monisha Ravisetti spotlights MIT researchers who have successfully recorded the scale formation of butterfly wings during its transformation. “Understanding their schematics could ultimately benefit constructed materials like windows and thermal systems and even bring an ethereal quality to textiles,” writes Ravisetti.