Level 1 — Absolute Beginner
Engineers at MIT built a tiny flying robot. It is about the size of an insect.
The robot has a new computer brain. The brain uses artificial intelligence, or AI, to fly better.
With the new brain, the robot flies much faster. It can also do ten flips in the air in just eleven seconds.
The robot can still fly well even when the wind blows. One day, small robots like this could search inside broken buildings after an earthquake.
- robot
- a machine that can move and do tasks on its own
- insect
- a small animal like a bee or a fly, often with wings
- artificial intelligence
- computer programs that can learn and make decisions
- brain
- the part that controls thinking, here meaning a computer system
- speed
- how fast something moves
- flip
- a turn where the body rotates all the way around
- wind
- moving air
- earthquake
- a sudden shaking of the ground
Level 2 — Elementary
Engineers at MIT have given their tiny, insect sized flying robot a major upgrade by building a new artificial intelligence system to control how it moves.
The new AI control system has two parts that work together, balancing strong performance with the need to run quickly on such a small machine. Using this system, the robot's top speed increased by about 450 percent, and its acceleration increased by about 250 percent, compared with the team's earlier results.
The improvement lets the robot pull off much more demanding moves. In one test, it completed ten full somersaults in a row in only eleven seconds, all while researchers tried to blow it off course with gusts of wind.
Because of their small size, robots like this one could someday fly through narrow gaps and dangerous spaces that regular drones cannot enter, such as searching through the rubble left behind by an earthquake.
- upgrade
- an improvement that makes something work better
- control system
- the part of a machine that manages how it moves or behaves
- performance
- how well something works or functions
- acceleration
- the rate at which speed increases
- somersault
- a movement where the body rolls or flips completely over
- gust
- a sudden, strong rush of wind
- rubble
- broken pieces of stone, brick, or concrete from a destroyed structure
- narrow
- having a small width, not wide
Level 3 — Intermediate
A team of engineers at MIT has significantly advanced the capabilities of its miniature, insect scale flying robot by developing a new artificial intelligence based controller designed specifically for the machine's tight constraints on size and computing power.
The controller relies on a two part architecture that balances aggressive flight performance against the limited computational resources available on such a small platform. Deployed on the robot, the system delivered a roughly 450 percent increase in top speed and a roughly 250 percent increase in acceleration relative to the team's previous benchmark results.
These gains translated directly into more demanding aerobatic maneuvers. During testing, the robot executed ten consecutive somersaults in just eleven seconds, maintaining stability even as researchers deliberately introduced wind disturbances intended to knock it off its intended flight path.
The research team believes the advance moves aerial microrobots meaningfully closer to matching the agility of real insects, a milestone with practical implications: because of their diminutive size, such robots could eventually navigate cramped, hazardous environments that conventional drones cannot enter, including searching through earthquake rubble while avoiding walls, debris, and falling objects.
- miniature
- much smaller than usual
- constraint
- a limitation that restricts what is possible
- architecture
- the overall design or structure of a system
- computational
- relating to calculation performed by a computer
- aerobatic
- relating to spectacular flying maneuvers
- disturbance
- something that disrupts a normal or expected pattern
- agility
- the ability to move quickly and easily
- diminutive
- extremely small in size
Level 4 — Advanced
Researchers at MIT have achieved a substantial leap in the flight capabilities of their insect scale aerial microrobot by engineering a bespoke artificial intelligence controller tailored to the severe size and computational constraints inherent to platforms operating at this scale.
At the heart of the advance lies a bifurcated control architecture, one designed explicitly to reconcile the competing demands of aggressive aerodynamic performance and the modest onboard processing budget available to a machine of insect proportions. Deployed in flight tests, the architecture yielded an approximately 450 percent increase in peak velocity and a roughly 250 percent increase in acceleration relative to the team's prior benchmark, figures that represent a marked departure from incremental prior progress in the field.
The practical consequence of these gains was demonstrated through a demanding aerobatic sequence in which the robot executed ten consecutive somersaults within eleven seconds, sustaining flight stability even as researchers introduced deliberate wind perturbations engineered to divert it from its intended trajectory.
In the estimation of the research team, the achievement narrows, meaningfully, the persistent gap between engineered aerial microrobots and the flight agility exhibited by their biological insect counterparts, a convergence carrying tangible implications: platforms of this diminutive scale could eventually be deployed to traverse confined, structurally compromised environments inaccessible to conventional drones, threading through debris fields and collapsed structures, such as those left in the aftermath of an earthquake, while circumventing obstacles that would ground larger, less nimble aircraft.
- bespoke
- custom designed for a particular purpose
- bifurcated
- divided into two distinct branches or parts
- reconcile
- to make two seemingly conflicting things compatible with each other
- aerodynamic
- relating to the way air moves around a solid object, such as an aircraft
- perturbation
- a disturbance that causes a system to deviate from its normal path
- convergence
- the coming together of two or more things toward a similar point
- traverse
- to travel across or through something
- nimble
- quick and light in movement or action
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