Squishy robotic manta ray flaps its wings to spy in the ocean

Alice Klein\'s The Abyss droneA soft-
Body robots swimming like manta ray are designed to monitor underwater creatures without disturbing them.
Most transparent robots do not have motors or other rigid machines, much faster than other soft robotic fish.
Li Tiefeng of Zhejiang University, Hangzhou, China, said the goal is to explore underwater areas with robots.
It can be used to investigate shipwrecks, aircraft wrecks, and coral reefs.
\"The soft body will make it easy for robots to dive into coral reefs without damaging them,\" he said . \".
Robots are increasingly made of soft, resilient materials that make them more resilient and more compatible with living things.
However, there is no traditional hard
Circuit boards and motors are a challenge.
Use the motor to move around in mantaray-
Inspired by the robot, Li and his colleagues made artificial fin muscles with a flexible polymer called dielectric elasticity. A silicone-
The packaged lithium battery provides a circulating voltage to squeeze and release the material, causing the muscles to bend up and down.
This flips the fins of the light, made of a thin layer of silicone film so that the light can move in the water.
The rest of the remote control robot weighs 90g and has a wingspan of 22 cm, made of a silicone body and tail for steering.
In addition to the small battery pack and two magnets that help to manipulate the tail, all components are transparent.
At the highest speed, robots can swim 6 cm per second.
This breaks the previous record of 3 cm per second for soft underwater robots, but is still much slower than similar robots --sized fish.
The researchers found that the electronic line can withstand the temperature between 0.
4 °C and 74 °C, swim for 3 hours on a single charge, and monitor the surrounding environment with a small camera.
Li said the flexibility and transparent camouflage of the robot\'s light should allow it to monitor the underwater environment without disturbing or damaging the underwater environment.
\"Marine life will be harder
\"Transparent robots,\" he said.
Underwater electronic equipment does not pose an electric shock risk to marine life, as the Circuit of the robot is set to make the surrounding water as a ground electrode-the end of the electrical energy consumption.
\"This is a very good idea,\" said Gursel Aliciat of Wollongong University in Australia . \".
Alici said that while other types of robotic swimmers are made of soft parts, including parts that mimic octopus, fish and jellyfish, man fish is a unique understanding of the concept
Whether it will have practical applications remains to be seen, he said.
Reference Magazine: Progress in science1126/sciadv.