Rivas David P, Sokolich Max, Das Sambeeta
Department of Mechanical Engineering, 130 Academy Street, Newark, DE, USA.
Soft Matter. 2024 Dec 11;20(48):9523-9527. doi: 10.1039/d4sm00810c.
Control of individual micromotors within a group would allow for improved efficiency, greater ability to accomplish complex tasks, higher throughput, and increased adaptability. However, independent control of micromotors remains a significant challenge. Typical actuation techniques, such as chemical and magnetic, are uniform over the workspace and therefore cannot control one micromotor independently of the others. To address this challenge, we demonstrate a novel control method of applying a localized region of UV light that activates a single light-responsive TiO micromotor at a time. To achieve this, a digital micromirror device (DMD) was employed which is capable of highly precise localized illumination. To demonstrate this precise user-defined control, patterns of micromotors were created selective actuation and magnetic steering. In addition, a closed-loop system was also developed which automates the guidance of individual micromotors to specified locations, illustrating the potential for more efficient and precise control of the micromotors.
对一组中的单个微电机进行控制，将提高效率、增强完成复杂任务的能力、提高吞吐量并增强适应性。然而，对微电机进行独立控制仍然是一项重大挑战。典型的驱动技术，如化学和磁性驱动，在工作空间内是均匀的，因此无法独立于其他微电机控制单个微电机。为应对这一挑战，我们展示了一种新颖的控制方法，即应用局部紫外光区域，一次激活单个光响应性TiO微电机。为实现这一点，采用了一种数字微镜器件（DMD），它能够进行高精度的局部照明。为证明这种精确的用户定义控制，创建了微电机图案以进行选择性驱动和磁性转向。此外，还开发了一个闭环系统，该系统可自动将单个微电机引导至指定位置，展示了对微电机进行更高效、精确控制的潜力。
