Festo provides a range of industrial control and automation products including robotics. It also does a good bit of research in this area as well. One of the latest things to crawl out of the labs is Festo’s BionicANTs.
âWatch “3D Printed Robotic Ants Work Together to Solve Tasks” curated by Engineering TV, below:
The robots are created using 3D-molded interconnect device (MID) technology. The laser-sintered components have conductors that are visible, adding to the artistic design of the critters. The robot’s head has a stereo camera and sensors. The six legs are powered by piezo electric motors.
The BionicANTs (autonomous networking technology) are designed to work together. They can communicate and coordinate with each other. This type of swarm robotics is an active area of study.
BionicANTs are not the only thing that we have seen from Festo. It has also been playing with birds (see “New Robot Designs Are For The Birds”). We just wonder whether the birds will be eating the ants for lunch.