Title
Wireless resonant magnetic microactuators.
Abstract
Rapid advances in miniaturization and robotics are presenting new opportunities for
collaboration between the elds of robotics and medicine. Since their development in
the late 1990s, minimally invasive robotic systems have become an accepted partner
in the surgical suite. This trend has continued with the development of noninvasive
camera pills for GI tract inspection. Further miniaturization and development
of noninvasive microrobotic platforms and procedures will occur in the near future.
This thesis contributes to the development of viable medical microrobots with the
presentation of new wireless micromotors capable of providing power and propulsion
to sub-millimeter wireless robotic platforms. The wireless resonant actuator can be
individually actuated by frequency-dependent power, which is delivered by oscillating
external magnetic elds. By relying on magnetic forces between neighboring soft
magnetic bodies, a high-power, individually addressable, scalable wireless microactuator
was created. Utilizing the energy amplification of impact, impact forces as high
as 300 microN have been demonstrated. The actuator is used to provide power, propulsion
and control to a 300x300x70 micron3 microrobotic platform that can be driven
with a full three degrees of freedom and can manipulate objects on a
flat substrate in both air and liquid environments. An undergraduate student team using the microrobotic.
Description
University of Minnesota Ph.d. dissertation. December 2008. Major: Mechanical Engineering. Advisor: Bradley J. Nelson. 1 computer file (PDF); x, 147 pages., appendices A-B.
Suggested Citation
Vollmers, Karl Eric.
(2008).
Wireless resonant magnetic microactuators..
Retrieved from the University of Minnesota Digital Conservancy,
https://hdl.handle.net/11299/47823.