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ROBOTICSFeathered
Fliers
A pigeon-based robot could
inspire next-generation dronesAs far back as Icarus’s ill-fated aviation
attempt, humans have looked to birds for
inspiration in our airborne endeavors. But
truly birdlike flight with flexible, feathered
wings has long eluded us; for one thing,
engineers have struggled to understand
how birds control wing feathers. But two
new studies could change that. Research-
ers recently designed and flew a robot with
feathered wings that can change shape mid-
flight like birds’ do, giving it greater maneu-
verability than rigid drones.
To design the winged robot, the
re searchers first used motion-capture video
to examine how pigeons fold and flex their
wings while flying. Based on the results,
they determined it was possible to control
20 feathers on each wing of a robot—
which they dubbed “PigeonBot”—via elastic
bands connected to just two joints. They
also used modern imaging technology to
gain new insight into how microscopic
structures temporarily hook many bird
species’ feathers to one another during
flight. PigeonBot needs real feathers to
work, so researchers must still find ways
to artificially reproduce feathers’ qualities
to take the technology to the next level.
The scientists modeled the robot’s wing
and feather movements closely on those
of live pigeons, says study co-author Eric
Chang, a mechanical engineer at Stanford
University. Pigeons can sharply turn and
bank by changing their wing shape, an
LENTINK LAB attribute the researchers wanted to buildStanford University© 2020 Scientific American