Milligram-Scale Micro Aerial Vehicle Design for Low-Voltage Operation

We present a 70mg, 3cm wing-span, flapping wing aerial vehicle capable of generating up to 60mg of lift using an electromagnetic actuator with low-voltage input (≈5.5V). Its design is novel, with the actuation and transmission integrated into a single resonant mechanism, thus not requiring any small-linear-displacement amplifying stages seen in other works. It can produce ±45° wing strokes and ±45° wing plane rotations at 98Hz operation mimicking relevant insects at this size scale. With required input power of only 250mW, it is, to the best of our knowledge, the most energy efficient electromagnetic design at the sub-100mg scale reported to date, and an order of magnitude more efficient than all other electromagnetic works.

I. Introduction

Milligram-scale flapping wing micro-aerial vehicles (MAVs)have a myriad of applications including, but not limited to, sensor networks, first responders for disasters, reconnaissance, and exploration of new planets. This range of applications is due to their expected insect-like maneuverability, navigation over tough terrains, and potential for swarm behavior, all of it owing to their small size and the promise for mass production. But this size scale also poses a significant challenge in the design of MAVs weighing below 100mg. Only a few designs are known to be capable of lifting their own weight [1]–[4] and except one [4] all do so via tethered operation providing external electric power. High energy density battery, high power actuator, and a mechanism producing large wing stroke angles are some of the major design problems.