Shape of things to comePollution-sniffing flea-like robot unveiled

Miners used to rely on canaries to detect the build-up of poisonous gases in mine shafts, and now an Italian mechanical engineer has designed an insect-like robot capable of leaping like a flea to cover vast swathes of territory to sniff out pollution. The insect-like robot was developed to detect mercury poisoning in the ground and leaps from place to place the way fleas or frogs do. The robot is 10 centimeter long and weighs 80 grams (see picture here). The inventors demonstrated the explots of the pollution-seeking robot in Switzerland during a symposium. “In developing the robot we focused on the way fleas and frogs jump. Robots like these are far more efficient than larger ones in scouring vast areas of land in a shorter time,” explained Umberto Scarfogliero of the University of Lucca. “We are now equipping these with special mercury-deteting sensors and will send them out to locate sources of pollution,” he added.

“The field of developing robots which imitate animal behavior is very active. Our common goal is to create minuscule robots which can move easily in natural environments,” said Cesare Stefaninifrom Pisa’s Scuola Superiore Sant’Anna. “Many documentaries made by National Geographic are filmed using cameras mounted on insect robots which can follows the movements of animals from up close,” he added.

The pollution-sniffing robot would be of great value to first responders and law enforcement: Aproaching and surveying a disaster site where destruction was casued by either terrorists and natural casues, it would be safer and quicker to unleash a fleet of mechanical insects to sniff the air and ground for the presence of toxins than to risk humans for the purpose.send in