Biomimetics or biomimicry is the emulation of the models, systems, and elements of nature for the purpose of solving complex human problems. The terms "biomimetics" and "biomimicry" are derived from Ancient Greek: βίος (bios), life, and μίμησις (mīmēsis), imitation, from μιμεῖσθαι (mīmeisthai), to imitate, from μῖμος (mimos), actor. A closely related field is bionics.
A honey bee is a eusocial flying insect within the genus Apis of the bee clade, all native to mainland Afro-Eurasia. After bees spread naturally throughout Africa and Eurasia, humans became responsible for the current cosmopolitan distribution of honey bees, introducing multiple subspecies into South America, North America, and Australia.
An unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV), commonly known as a drone, is an aircraft without any human pilot, crew, or passengers on board. UAVs were originally developed through the twentieth century for military missions too "dull, dirty or dangerous" for humans, and by the twenty-first, they had become essential assets to most militaries. As control technologies improved and costs fell, their use expanded to many non-military applications. These include aerial photography, precision agriculture, forest fire monitoring, river monitoring, environmental monitoring, policing and surveillance, infrastructure inspections, smuggling, product deliveries, entertainment, and drone racing.
Moths are a group of insects that includes all members of the order Lepidoptera that are not butterflies. They were previously classified as suborder Heterocera, but the group is paraphyletic with respect to butterflies and neither subordinate taxa are used in modern classifications. Moths make up the vast majority of the order. There are thought to be approximately 160,000 species of moth, many of which have yet to be described. Most species of moth are nocturnal, although there are also crepuscular and diurnal species.
Insecticides are pesticides used to kill insects. They include ovicides and larvicides used against insect eggs and larvae, respectively. Insecticides are used in agriculture, medicine, industry and by consumers. Insecticides are claimed to be a major factor behind the increase in the 20th-century's agricultural productivity. Nearly all insecticides have the potential to significantly alter ecosystems; many are toxic to humans and/or animals; some become concentrated as they spread along the food chain.
A bumblebee is any of over 250 species in the genus Bombus, part of Apidae, one of the bee families. This genus is the only extant group in the tribe Bombini, though a few extinct related genera are known from fossils. They are found primarily in higher altitudes or latitudes in the Northern Hemisphere, although they are also found in South America, where a few lowland tropical species have been identified. European bumblebees have also been introduced to New Zealand and Tasmania. Female bumblebees can sting repeatedly, but generally ignore humans and other animals.
Pollinator decline is the reduction in abundance of insect and other animal pollinators in many ecosystems worldwide that began being recorded at the end of the 20th century. Multiple lines of evidence exist for the reduction of wild pollinator populations at the regional level, especially within Europe and North America. Similar findings from studies in South America, China and Japan make it reasonable to suggest that declines are occurring around the globe. The majority of studies focus on bees, particularly honeybee and bumblebee species, with a smaller number involving hoverflies and lepidopterans.
A micro air vehicle (MAV), or micro aerial vehicle, is a class of man-portable miniature UAVs whose size enables them to be used in low altitude, close-in support operations. Modern MAVs can be as small as 5 centimeters. Development is driven by commercial, research, government, and military purposes; with insect-sized aircraft reportedly expected in the future. The small craft allows remote observation of hazardous environments inaccessible to ground vehicles. MAVs have been built for hobby purposes such as aerial robotics contests and aerial photography.
Remote control animals are animals that are controlled remotely by humans. Some applications require electrodes to be implanted in the animal's nervous system connected to a receiver which is usually carried on the animal's back. The animals are controlled by the use of radio signals. The electrodes do not move the animal directly, as if controlling a robot; rather, they signal a direction or action desired by the human operator and then stimulate the animal's reward centres if the animal complies. These are sometimes called bio-robots or robo-animals. They can be considered to be cyborgs as they combine electronic devices with an organic life form and hence are sometimes also called cyborg-animals or cyborg-insects.
The western honey bee or European honey bee is the most common of the 7–12 species of honey bees worldwide. The genus name Apis is Latin for "bee", and mellifera is the Latin for "honey-bearing" or "honey carrying", referring to the species' production of honey.
A cyborg —a portmanteau of cybernetic and organism—is a being with both organic and biomechatronic body parts. The term was coined in 1960 by Manfred Clynes and Nathan S. Kline.
Robotics is an interdisciplinary branch of electronics and communication, computer science and engineering. Robotics involves the design, construction, operation, and use of robots. The goal of robotics is to design machines that can help and assist humans. Robotics integrates fields of mechanical engineering, electrical engineering, information engineering, mechatronics engineering, electronics, biomedical engineering, computer engineering, control systems engineering, software engineering, mathematics, etc.
The following outline is provided as an overview of and topical guide to robotics:
Robert J. Wood is a roboticist and a professor of electrical engineering at the Harvard School of Engineering and Applied Sciences and the Wyss Institute for Biologically Inspired Engineering at Harvard University, and is the director of the Harvard Microrobotics Laboratory. He holds a PhD in electrical engineering from the University of California at Berkeley. At Harvard University, he directs the NSF-funded RoboBees project, a 5-year project to build a swarm of robotic bees. In 2008, he was named to the MIT Technology Reviews TR35 list and became a recipient of the Presidential Early Career Award for Scientists and Engineers.
The DelFly is a fully controllable camera-equipped flapping wing Micro Air Vehicle or Ornithopter developed at the Micro Air Vehicle Lab of the Delft University of TechnologyArchived 2019-10-19 at the Wayback Machine in collaboration with Wageningen University.
Materially engineered artificial pollinators are experimental radiowave-controlled micro-drones that use ionic liquid gels for artificial pollination without living insects.
Asynchronous muscles are muscles in which there is no one-to-one relationship between electrical stimulation and mechanical contraction. These muscles are found in 75% of flying insects and have convergently evolved 7-10 times. Unlike their synchronous counterparts that contract once per neural signal, mechanical oscillations trigger force production in asynchronous muscles. Typically, the rate of mechanical contraction is an order of magnitude greater than electrical signals. Although they achieve greater force output and higher efficiency at high frequencies, they have limited applications because of their dependence on mechanical stretch.
Adrian Leland Rees Thomas is a professor of biomechanics at the University of Oxford and Director of Studies in Biological Sciences at Lady Margaret Hall, Oxford running the Animal Flight Research Group. He is co-founder and Chief Scientific Officer at Animal Dynamics and is also chairman of the flight section of the Bionis International Biomimetics Network.
Silvia Ferrari is an American aerospace engineer. She is John Brancaccio Professor at the Sibley School of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering at Cornell University and also the director of the Laboratory for Intelligent Systems and Control (LISC) at the same university.
An insectoid robot is a, usually small, robot featuring some insect-like features. These can include the methods of locomotion, methods of navigation, and artificial intelligence based on insect models. Many of the problems faced by miniature robot designers have been solved by insect evolution. Researchers naturally look to insects for inspiration and solutions.
