Researchers build tiny electronic backpacks to remote-control live beetles
Engineers involved in cyborg insect research are learning some surprising things about how beetles fly by hard-wiring them for radio-controlled flight. The researchers, from the University of California at Berkeley, and Singapore’s Nanyang Technological University, published their findings March 16 in the journal Current Biology.
The researchers strapped itsy-bitsy computers and wireless radios on the backs of giant flower beetles (Mecynorrhina torquata), according to a report by Phys.org. By recording neuromuscular information as the beetles flew freely around, they discovered that a muscle known to control the folding of their wings also was essential to steering. Then, they used the data to make the insects’ remote-controlled turns more precise.
In their study, the engineers show how helpful wireless sensors can be to biological research. They say their research could be useful in many areas, including sending sensors ahead of perilous search-and-rescue operations.
“This is a demonstration of how tiny electronics can answer interesting, fundamental questions for the larger scientific community,” said principal investigator Michel Maharbiz in the Phys.org report. “Biologists trying to record and study flying insects typically had to do so with the subject tethered. It had been unclear if tethering interfered with the insect’s natural flight motion.” Maharbiz is an associate professor at UC-Berkeley’s Department of Electrical Engineering and Computer Sciences.
Specifically, the new study found that the coleopteran third axillary sclerite (3Ax) muscle used for folding a beetle’s wings also played an important role in the insect’s ability to turn to the left or right. The researchers were able to test the muscle’s function by stimulating it during flight and controlling its graded turns.
Each miniature beetle backpack weighed about a gram and was made up of a tiny built-in wireless transmitter, receiver, and microcontroller. Each beetle had six electrodes connected to its optic lobes and flight muscles. The device was powered by a 3.9-volt lithium battery.
0 Comments