Evidence map›Paper›PMID 35888953›Full record

ArticleMicromachines2022

Design, Characterization, and Liftoff of an Insect-Scale Soft Robotic Dragonfly Powered by Dielectric Elastomer Actuators.

Yufeng Chen, Cathleen Arase, Zhijian Ren, Pakpong Chirarattananon

Abstract read
In one paragraph

Article in Micromachines, 2022. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 6 papers.

0numbers the graph read from it
0cells of the map it votes in
6citing papers in PubMed
–field-weighted citation impact
1 · What the graph read from it

What it found

Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.

The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.

2 · The registry

The trial behind it

Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.

Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.

3 · Its place in the literature

Who cites it

6 citing papers in PubMed.

  1. Light-driven micro/nanobots.Nanophotonics (Berlin, Germany) · 2025
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4 · The record

Corrections and comments

PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.

5 · Who and what money

Authors and funding

4 authors.

Yufeng ChenResearch Laboratory of Electronics, Department of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science, Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), Cambridge, MA 02139, USA.ORCID 0000-0001-5407-3211
Cathleen AraseResearch Laboratory of Electronics, Department of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science, Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), Cambridge, MA 02139, USA.
Zhijian RenResearch Laboratory of Electronics, Department of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science, Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), Cambridge, MA 02139, USA.ORCID 0000-0001-6502-5194
Pakpong ChirarattananonDepartment of Biomedical Engineering, City University of Hong Kong, Hong Kong, China.ORCID 0000-0003-0142-8394

Funding

MIT MISTI F2244201Research Support Committee Grant, Research Laboratory of Electronics (RLE) at MIT 2244181
6 · The paper itself

Abstract

Dragonflies are agile and efficient flyers that use two pairs of wings for demonstrating exquisite aerial maneuvers. Compared to two-winged insects such as bees or flies, dragonflies leverage forewing and hindwing interactions for achieving higher efficiency and net lift. Here we develop the first at-scale dragonfly-like robot and investigate the influence of flapping-wing kinematics on net lift force production. Our 317 mg robot is driven by two independent dielectric elastomer actuators that flap four wings at 350 Hz. We extract the robot flapping-wing kinematics using a high-speed camera, and further measure the robot lift forces at different operating frequencies, voltage amplitudes, and phases between the forewings and hindwings. Our robot achieves a maximum lift-to-weight ratio of 1.49, and its net lift force increases by 19% when the forewings and hindwings flap in-phase compared to out-of-phase flapping. These at-scale experiments demonstrate that forewing-hindwing interaction can significantly influence lift force production and aerodynamic efficiency of flapping-wing robots with passive wing pitch designs. Our results could further enable future experiments to achieve feedback-controlled flights.

Indexed as

biologically inspired robotdielectric elastomer actuatorflapping-wingmicro-aerial-vehiclesoft robot

Identifiers

PMID35888953
PMCPMC9317235

What OpenQuestion holds

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Registered trials

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Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.