The Bots And Bees

Meet the smallest flying robot ever made: RoboBee. Weighing about as much as a quarter of a paperclip and able to fit on the tip of your finger, the tiny flying machine represented the massive efforts of two Harvard engineers, Elizabeth Helbling and Noah Jafferis. They worked to push the limits of miniaturization—and were able to see RoboBee take flight in 2007.

Although their creation was already a marvel, Helbling and Jafferis were determined to improve upon its features to one day assemble fleets of RoboBees. They removed the wire tether that provided its power and control. Doing so would require them to balance payload, power, and thrust without scaling up. It took three years, but Helbling and Jafferis modified their designs and equipped the RoboBee with miniature solar-powered cells and a control board, bringing the researchers vision of tiny flying swarms of robots one step closer to reality.


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Credits

Produced by Luke Groskin
Edited by Paul Frost
Music by Audio Network

Additional images courtesy of Farrell Helbling, the Wyss Institute at Harvard University, Springer Handbook (C.C. BY 2.0) Youtube User Charbax (C.C BY 2.0) U.S. Army (C.C BY 2.0)

Meet the Producer

About Luke Groskin

Luke Groskin is Science Friday’s video producer. He’s on a mission to make you love spiders and other odd creatures.

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