Helicopter Pilot #2: "Oh, my God! Bees! Bees! Millions of Bees!"
Maureen Schuster: "Attention! Attention! This is Miss Schuster. Please listen very carefully. A swarm of killer bees is coming this way."
-The Swarm(1978)
Research Articles
When people typically think of swarms, they think of insects. Swarms generally go hand in hand with images of killer bees and locusts plaguing humans. That's not always going to be the case though, and the general connotation of swarm will change sooner than you think. Not only are robotic swarms coming, but some early prototype swarms are already here. Consider, for instance, the use of robotic swarms for military applications. Autonomous systems like the PERDIS prototypes developed at MIT are almost ready to be deployed for surveillance usage. PERDIS is particularly amazing because the swarm as a whole operates with minimal human input, using artificial intelligence to choose the best way to arrange themselves to achieve a mission objective. It's rather unfortunate because it seems like the general public often is confused about what a drone actually is. A drone is any vehicle that can operate completely autonomously. Many news outlets including CBS, call drones any sort of RC flying vehicle. But those are not autonomous. They still have a full human operator. PERDIS, on the other hand, seems to be a drone in the fullest sense of the word: completely autonomous and capable of many different mission objectives.
I really get more excited by the day when I see just how my interests can align and point towards a single pursuit or system. I have a great interest in artificial intelligence/neural networks, drones, and microelectromechanical systems. PERDIS is all of these things and more. In a future war, surprise attacks may not be carried out with conventional explosives and weaponry. There may not even be any sort of visible attack. It may just be power substations being taken offline, one by one, and then a few minutes later, a couple of planes passing harmlessly overhead, and a few seconds later, the sky filling with a massive, moving cloud of drones. There will not be a front lines. On a more geopolitical note, this new technological reality is why I'm concerned the U.S. is spending too much money on conventional weaponry that could be rendered completely useless in coming wars with the press of an enter key. We should double down on technological warfare, cyber-espionage, elite hacking divisions, autonomous weaponry, EMP shielding, and perhaps even biological weaponry. Guns won't mean much when you can cripple a government with a couple of computers and convenient zero day exploits (a zero day exploit is just a program bug that is never found and exists from the very beginning of the release of a program).
It all begins and ends with smart fusions of EE and CS, but very much MEMS as well. On a much less scary note, drone swarms using MEMS technology are applicable in remote mapping, agricultural use, ecosystem monitoring, infrastructure management, and also apparently personal transportation (according to what Dubai is planning: Dubai Drones). Other interesting uses for MEMS are in ground based robotics. An interesting caveat of reduced size is that many MEMS systems are actually extremely good at causing macro-scale change, like a small robot carrying a large object. By studying the structure of ants, researchers at Stanford were able to develop robots that can carry up to 2000 times their body weight in large swarms by synchronizing small forces to their advantage. I don't really understand a lot of the MEMS but I have ordered an introductory book to find out more. In The Pleasure of Finding Things Out Feynman did talk about the disproportionate effect that some physical forces can exert on microscopic robots and it seems that the researchers at Stanford are using this to their advantage. However, I'm sure the research being done at the lab I work at is twice as good as what goes on at Stanford (everyone knows that Cal is vastly superior).
MEMS is itself generally relatively simple in what it encompasses. Generally it is just the design of microscopic mechanical systems in conjunction with tiny electrical sensors and associated circuitry. MEMS circuitry often provides the sensing part of microscopic IC's. The combined design and fabrication of IC's, MEMS actuators and MEMS sensors through one instrument, application, and industrial fabrication process is an important goal for the proliferation of MEMS into the world. In my time at the lab, I have seen MEMS actuators etched onto silicon wafers. Unlike 3D printing, which is an additive process, the etching of these devices seems to be a subtractive process, where unneeded material is eroded away. From what I've read about 3D printing, it would be interesting to see if any companies or even any organizations are working on a 3D printer that can combine the 3D printing of material with the 3D printing of MEMS circuitry and components. While this may be a ludicrously difficult goal, it also seems like a worthwhile one that if relatively affordable, could quite literally herald the rise of true consumer nanotechnology. Thinking about being able to print an entire integrated circuit on my desk gives me shivers.
Though my head is very much in the clouds in considering this type of thing, it is also very fun to think about. I'm doing slightly more base work right now at the lab, just documenting all my code and refining the software architecture, or rather coming up with a more successful one. It's starting to feel like I'm designing the tower of Babel. I've got to tighten the whole design up, and I've placed all my code on feature lock while I clarify all the design details. Feature lock is in this case my more sensible brain half forcing my other less sensible brain half to cut the crap and stop designing new frivolous features. In more expanded teams, it's actually an agreement by many different coders to stop making new features.
So I suppose my head is in the clouds, but my feet are planted on the ground. I've got a lot of things that I'm doing that I will relate to you later, as soon as I've actually done them. In my opinion there is no use in being premature. Until next week!
Works Cited
Etching Processes. MEMSnet, n.d. Web. 19 Apr. 2017.
"What Is MEMS Technology?" MNX. MEMS & Nanotechnology Exchange, n.d. Web. 19 Apr. 2017.
Martin, David. "New Generation of Drones Set to Revolutionize Warfare." CBS News. CBS Interactive, 08 Jan. 2017. Web. 19 Apr. 2017.
"Combined Strength of Six Ant-Inspired Microrobots Can Move a Two-Ton Car." PBS. Public Broadcasting Service, 14 Mar. 2016. Web. 19 Apr. 2017.