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Nano-motors For Microbots

Posted by samzenpus on from the big-things-in-micro-packages dept.

Smivs writes "The BBC are reporting on the development of tiny motors the size of a grain of salt which could power surgical Microbots. Some surgical procedures are hindered by the size or inflexibility of current instruments. For example, the labyrinthine network of blood vessels in the brain prevents the use of catheters threaded through larger blood vessels. Researchers have long envisioned that trends of miniaturisation would lead to tiny robots that could get around easily in the body. The problem until now has been powering them. Conventional electric motors do not perform as well as they are scaled down in size. As they approach millimetre dimensions, they barely have the power to overcome the resistance in their bearings. Now, research reported in the Journal of Micromechanics and Microengineering has demonstrated a motor about 1/4mm wide, about the width of two human hairs."

6 of 77 comments (clear)

  1. That's no nano-motor boy, no nano-motor! by EdZ · · Score: 4, Informative

    0.25mm is hardly nanoscale. It's not even milli-scale!

    1. Re:That's no nano-motor boy, no nano-motor! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Informative

      These ones are better.

  2. Re:Sizes by ya+really · · Score: 4, Informative

    As an American physics student, I'm insulted :p, but this is generally correct for most Americans. Hooray, lets count in base 12 or base 16 or "base whatever feels nice." Base 10 you say? No way that could ever be easier.

    Though I'd like to add at least we stick with a system, the Brits seem to have an identity crisis where they cant seem to decide if they like the Imperial System or Metric. Pint glasses, miles per hour, liters, pounds (and not the monetary kind), etc etc. Now that's pretty crazy.

  3. No change in 50 years??! by AaronLawrence · · Score: 2, Informative

    From TFA:

    Take a look however at the motors, and there are few changes from the motors available in the 1950s.

    Er, maybe the basic design is similar, but motors are extraordinarily smaller (such as the 5mm wide specimens used in radio control kits nowadays) and there are new designs as well, such as stepper motors.

    I think this article slightly exaggerates to make this seem more exciting...

    Another random thought: this article assumes that a rotating motor is still needed, but why? If bacteria and other things move around by other means, maybe the only efficient methods of movement at small scales are NOT rotating?

    --
    For every expert, there is an equal and opposite expert. - Arthur C. Clarke
  4. Re:Tiny balls by jank1887 · · Score: 2, Informative
    mirco balls?

    http://eng.umd.edu/media/pressreleases/pr092208_bearings.html

  5. Re:Sizes by Doctor+Faustus · · Score: 2, Informative

    take Pi for instance. 22/7 is exact
    Pi is irrational. That means no fraction is exactly correct.