PCBot: a Minimalist Robot Designed for Swarm Applications

Jingxian Wang,Michael Rubenstein,Jingxian Wang,Michael Rubenstein

Complexity, cost, and power requirements for the actuation of individual robots can play a large factor in limiting the size of robotic swarms. Here we present PCBot, a minimalist robot that can precisely move on an orbital shake table using a bi-stable solenoid actuator built directly into its PCB. This allows the actuator to be built as part of the automated PCB manufacturing process, greatly re...