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'Flapping wings' powered by the sun

Date:
February 19, 2020
Source:
American Chemical Society
Summary:
In ancient Greek mythology, Icarus' wax wings melted when he dared to fly too close to the sun. Now, researchers have made artificial wings that are actually powered by the sun. The tiny wings, which can flap even faster than those of butterflies, could someday be used in robots or devices for solar energy harvesting, the researchers say.
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In ancient Greek mythology, Icarus' wax wings melted when he dared to fly too close to the sun. Now, researchers reporting in ACS Applied Materials & Interfaces have made artificial wings that are actually powered by the sun. The tiny wings, which can flap even faster than those of butterflies, could someday be used in robots or devices for solar energy harvesting, the researchers say. 

Light-driven actuators -- devices that convert light directly into mechanical work -- have attracted attention because they are wireless and easy to control. However, to keep going, they usually require a high-intensity light source that can be turned on and off, or additional hardware. Ningyi Yuan, Jianning Ding and colleagues wanted to develop a flexible film that could convert natural sunlight into a flapping motion, without the need for additional hardware.

To make their device, which they called a flexible bio-butterfly-wing (FBBW), the researchers coated a thin polymer sheet with a nanocrystalline metallic film. When the team fixed one end of the FBBW strip to a support and shone simulated sunlight onto it, the temperature of the strip increased, and the free end curled up because of the large difference in thermal expansion between the metal and polymer layers. Then, the curved part of the FBBW shaded the metallic layer below, causing the temperature to drop and the strip to unfold. Continuous cycles of bending and unfolding produced a flapping motion that could exceed the frequency of actual butterfly wings. The team demonstrated the FBBW in a light-driven whirligig and sailboat, and in a device that converted sunlight into an electric current. It could someday be used in flying animal robots, among other applications, the researchers say.


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Materials provided by American Chemical Society. Note: Content may be edited for style and length.


Journal Reference:

  1. Xu Dong, Jiawei Xu, Xiuzhu Xu, Shengping Dai, Xiaoshuang Zhou, Changhao Ma, Guanggui Cheng, Ningyi Yuan, Jianning Ding. Sunlight-Driven Continuous Flapping-Wing Motion. ACS Applied Materials & Interfaces, 2020; 12 (5): 6460 DOI: 10.1021/acsami.9b20250

Cite This Page:

American Chemical Society. "'Flapping wings' powered by the sun." ScienceDaily. ScienceDaily, 19 February 2020. <www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2020/02/200219113744.htm>.
American Chemical Society. (2020, February 19). 'Flapping wings' powered by the sun. ScienceDaily. Retrieved March 27, 2024 from www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2020/02/200219113744.htm
American Chemical Society. "'Flapping wings' powered by the sun." ScienceDaily. www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2020/02/200219113744.htm (accessed March 27, 2024).

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