A research group led by a visiting professor at Waseda University's Nano Life Research Organization, Hideko Kojima, has developed a "robot crystal" that walks like a scaled insect when heated and cooled, and runs at high speed.
Until now, there was a preconceived notion that crystals are hard and fragile, but in 2007 it was first reported that diarylethene crystals were bent by light, overturning the image of crystals.Since then, visiting professor at Kojima Research Institute has developed various crystals that bend by light.However, most of the movements so far have been in-situ movements such as bending and expansion and contraction, and it has not been possible to move the crystal to another place.
This time, for the first time in the world, the group has realized two different modes of movement: the crystal walks slowly while repeatedly bending like an inchworm, and the bent crystal runs at high speed while rolling.When the relationship between the movement of the crystal and the temperature change was investigated in detail, bending due to the phase transition occurred due to repeated heating and cooling, and the asymmetrical shape of the crystal became the driving force for movement such as "walking" and "running". It turned out that.
Since this "robot crystal" developed this time is soft and light, it is expected that a new type of soft robot using this crystal will be realized.
Paper information:[Nature Communications] Walking and rolling of crystals induced by phase transition
