Mechanical & Fluid Systems

Nimble Dimples: Agile Underwater Vehicles Inspired by Golf Balls

A spherical prototype that can change its surface from smooth to dimpled, cuts through drag and generates lift. Underwater or aerial vehicles with dimples like golf balls...

Careful Heating Unlocks Unprecedented Sensitivity to Pressure in Semiconductor Materials

Stronger cell phone signals, more accurate sensors, and cleaner energy may be achieved by adding a simple step to the industrial fabrication process of...

Tape-Based Robot Reaches Far When Extended

It’s a game a lot of us played as children — and maybe even later in life: unspooling measuring tape to see how far it would extend before bending. But to engineers at the University of California San Diego, this game was an inspiration, suggesting that measuring tape could become a great material for a robotic gripper. Read on to learn more about their robot, GRIP-tape.

Remotely Moving Objects Underwater Using Sound

Sound can do more than just provide a nice beat. Sound waves have been used for everything from mapping the seafloor to breaking apart kidney stones. Thanks to a unique material structure,...

Product Focus: Güdel Introduces Swiss Quality Tracks for Cobots

At Automate 2025, Güdel Inc. (Ann Arbor, MI), is highlighting two new technologies — Cobomover™ and a modular track system — that demonstrate its ability to solve...

How Much Do You Know About Servo Systems?

Without servo systems, there would be no automated factories. Since they’re so common, this quiz ought to be easy. Try it and see. How much do you know about servo systems? Test your knowledge with this quiz.

Is It a Material? Is It a Robot? It's Both!

Engineers have created a type of material that can expand, assume new shapes, move, and follow electromagnetic commands like a remotely controlled robot even though it lacks any motor or internal gears.

RoboBee Comes in for a Landing

The Harvard RoboBee has long shown it can fly, dive, and hover like a real insect. But what good is the miracle of flight without a safe way to land? A storied engineering achievement by the Harvard...

New Wearable Tech Simulates Realistic Touch

When it comes to haptic feedback, most technologies are limited to simple vibrations. But our skin is loaded with tiny sensors that detect pressure, vibration, stretching, and more. Now,...

New High-Speed Microscale 3D-Printing Technique

Researchers at Stanford University have introduced a more efficient processing technique that can print up to 1 million highly detailed and customizable microscale particles a day. Read on to learn more about it.

Gear Motors Help Put the Squeeze on Materials Requiring Dewatering

The applications that require dewatering are too numerous to list in their entirety. Dewatering is a process that — as its name suggests — separates fluids from solids, often converting what would otherwise go down the drain or end up in a landfill into saleable products. Read on to learn more about it and how gear motors come into play.

Fighting Fire with Electrically Assisted Wind

This device works to suppress flames using the power of conductive aerosols, small particles that can direct electricity.

A Compact, Versatile Robot Capable of Maneuvering Tight Spaces with a Heavy Payload

Researchers at EPFL and the Max Planck Institute for Intelligent Systems have developed a compact and versatile robot that can maneuver through tight spaces and transport payloads much heavier than itself.

Robot Works Inside E-Waste Recycling Facility

A researcher from Carnegie Mellon University’s School of Computer Science is using robotics to improve e-waste recycling.

When Mushrooms Control Robots

In creating a pair of new robots, Cornell researchers cultivated an unlikely component: fungal mycelia. By harnessing mycelia’s innate electrical signals, the researchers discovered a new way of controlling “biohybrid” robots that can potentially react to their environment better than their purely synthetic counterparts. Read on to learn more.

Using Embodied Energy to Power Modular Worms and Jellyfish

A modular worm robot built by the Organic Robotics Lab and a jellyfish that was a collaboration with the Archer Group, both in Cornell Engineering, demonstrate the benefits of “embodied energy.”

New on the Market

See what's new on the market, including Nikon Corporation's NEXIV VMF-K Series, a next-generation video measuring system; the surfaceCONTROL 3D snapshot sensors from Micro-Epsilon; InfraTec's INDU-SCAN base, a flexible and cost-effective thermography solution for use in industrial applications 24/7; Curtiss-Wright Actuation Division's Exlar® electric actuator product offerings; and more.

Cryogenic Oxygen Storage Modules (COSM)

NASA Kennedy Space Center engineers developed a Cryogenic Oxygen Storage Module to store oxygen in solid-state form and deliver it as a gas to an end-use environmental control and/or life support system. Read on to learn more about it.

Cryogenic Flux Capacitor

NASA’s Cryogenic Flux Capacitor capitalizes on the energy storage capacity of liquefied gases. By exploiting a unique attribute of nano-porous materials, aerogel in this case, fluid commodities such as oxygen, hydrogen, methane, etc. can be stored in a molecular surface-adsorbed state. Read on to learn more.

High-Speed Droplet Production in Microfluidic Devices

Researchers have introduced a microfluidic system that utilizes porous “inverse colloidal crystal” structures to dramatically improve the efficiency of microdroplet generation. Read on to learn more about it.

Ocean Platform Motion Control

NASA engineers have developed a new approach to mitigating unwanted motion in floating structures. Ideally suited to applications including offshore wind energy platforms and barges, the innovation uses water ballast as a motion damping fluid.