In this paper, a novel approach to achieving the independent control of multiple magnetic microrobots is presented. The approach utilizes a specialized substrate consisting of a fine grid of planar, MEMS-fabricated micro coils of the same size as the microrobots (≤ 500 μm). The coils can be used to generate real magnetic potentials and, therefore, attractive and repulsive forces in the workspac...

A new architecture allowing an increase of the photocurrent of a photovoltaic cell fabricated with a CMOS 0.18μm process is described. This cell has been designed specifically to power the onboard electronics of a 400μm × 600μm untethered microrobot propelled by magnetotactic bacteria (MTB). Four cascaded cells of an area of 200μm × 200μm each, provide a short circuit current of 70μA and an ope...

We demonstrate that the attractive magnetic force acting on a rotating magnetic device (e.g., a magnetic microrobot), actuated using a rotating magnet dipole, can be converted into a lateral force by rotating the actuator dipole according to a specific open-loop trajectory. Results show rotating magnetic devices can be rolled and simultaneously pushed along a surface by the lateral force, resul...

Here we present the design and fabrication of a 90mg hexapedal microrobot with overall footprint dimensions of 17 mm long x 23 mm wide. Utilizing smart composite microstructure fabrication techniques, we combine composite materials and polymers to form articulated structures that assemble into an eight degree of freedom robot. Using thin foil shape memory alloy actuators and inspiration from bi...