In the video above, scientists at Stanford University experiment to see if low-powered robots can be coaxed into acting as a team, and what they might be able to accomplish together. What they found is kind of startling.
Ants presented an example that got the scientists thinking. Even though each ant can lift 100 times its own body weight—and can tolerate 5,000 times its weight before its neck snaps—when they work together, they can move objects many times that.
Stanford researchers had added an adhesive based on gecko toes to their microTUG robots, and found that each one can move 2,000 times its weight. Very impressive. But what could multiple bots do if they worked together?
They looked at their fastest, strongest microbots first, but their quick, jerky motions made them impossible to synchronize, and 20 of them pulling together only doubled the pulling force of one.
The lab’s weaker running microrobots were another story: After working out a scheme that leveraged their slow, steady gait in sync, they got six little robots, each weighing in at a featherweight 12 grams, working together to move a 3,900-pound car (and driver).
