By Charles Carter, 04/11/22
Innovators from EPFL have developed a drone with edible rice cake wings to supply food for people stranded in remote locations e.g. mountain climbers.
Why not just use regular delivery drones being used to drop packages in cities?
Well, they work well for short distances in cities where battery swap/recharging infrasturcture exists, but not for longer distances in remote locations.
The team’s aim is to extend the range and calorie carrying capacity of the drone by building as much of it as possible from edible materials.
The work was presented at IEEE/RSJ International Conference on Intelligent Robots and Systems (IROS) conference in Kyoto last week.
How does it work?
Round rice cakes are cut into hexagonal shapes using a laser and stuck together with edible gelatin to form the wings.
They are wrapped in plastic to protect them from the elements.
Rice cakes have similar structural properties to expanded polypropylene (EPP) foam often used to build drone wings.
The 70 cm rice cake wingspans contains around 300 calories, enough for a light snack.
A battery powered motor drives a propeller at the front and smaller servo motors are used to control the non-edible rudder and elevators at the rear for steering.
This prototype flies at speeds of around 10 meters per second.
What are the potential benefits?
Regular drones can carry a food payload up to 30 percent of their total weight.
With this drone, the engineers managed to increase this to 50 percent, meaning an extended range for the same calorie content.
The 300 calorie delivery could keep a stranded climber going for another 2-3 days,
With the drone obviously unable to fly back once the wings have been eaten, a new drone would need to be sent each time.
Questions for you. Comment below
- First thought that comes into your head?
- Pros and cons according to you?
- Other applications of this approach?
- What could this be combined with?
Links
https://spectrum.ieee.org/edible-robots
تجربة و بتكرار رائد في إنقاص حياة ثمينة لأولائك المكتشفين و المبتكرين حول العالم من المهم الإهتمام للأشخاص الأكثر أهمية حول العالم و إنقاذ حياته المهمة وأبحاثهم المجدية و الفعالة في كل المجالات.
Maybe the biggest benefit is the hope that the drone brings, more than the calories it provides. To know you have been found, and help is on the way, must be a huge psychological factor in survival.