Summary of Outbrief
If the Internet is beginning to have "eyes and ears," Dr. Robert Full and his colleagues who examined the biomechanical intersection, believe that the next revolution will be programmable work—using the Internet and newly acquired knowledge and newly developed devices to give the Internet "legs and hands."
"I believe we are entering an age of integration," explained Dr. Full, "where biomaterials and neural sciences and techniques for biointerfaces and computational modeling will allow us to do biomotion or, more generally, programmable work. We believe that programmable work is, in fact, a central challenge."
He cited his work in mobility systems that can climb walls as an example of how he and his colleagues had to research the entire system of the gecko before they understood how it can move so fast with such great agility. Now that researchers understand the molecular function of tiny hairs on a gecko's foot, they can join with colleagues at another university who are studying ant locomotion. Together, they hope to build mobility platforms on a very small scale.
Returning to his summary of the discussion group's efforts, Dr. Full explained that they identified four "key enablers" that must be funded and researched in order to achieve success. The first enabler is design concepts and its sub-issues of (1) biological inspiration versus direct copying, and (2) the taming of complexity. As a biologist, Dr. Full does not advise engineers to copy nature because evolution works on a "just good enough" principle. Developers must see beyond this to extract from nature what is relevant to copy. Regarding complexity, he advises that new devices and techniques should be kept as simple as possible.
Energy management, the next enabler, manifests itself in three areas, he stated: energy exchange and storage, interaction with the environment, and the broad role of actuators and their performance with respect to energy density.
The third enabler is hierarchical control. Its internal issues include the identification of what is being controlled; following nature's direction to use passive dynamics as much as possible (e.g., understanding smarter, tuned mechanical systems); and the value of having many sensors and finding ways to integrate them.
Robustness is the last component and the values of effective operation and safety that are derived.
Dr. Full concluded by identifying several defense-related applications from biomechanical intersection. "Clearly, if we have high-mobility platforms, search-and-rescue is going to be possible. Detection, sampling, and removal of biohazards and mines and other devices will be another set of applications."
"We will be able to do well at reconnaissance and surveillance. And, finally, as discussed in previous talks, human augment, for the first time, really becomes a possibility," he said. |
