Animals Ancient and Modern- Biomimicry, Automata and Robotics

This week's theme at Science City dealt with animals so we focused on how animals have influenced technological innovations and how people have tried to emulate animals through robotics and automata.  We started with Land and then moved to Air & Sea.

LAND-

  We talked about what biomimicry is; imitating elements in nature to solve complex human problems, and looked at examples.

(image from: http://inhabitat.com/building-modelled-on-termites-eastgate-centre-in-zimbabwe/)

Then we talked about robotics and emulating nature, we looked at some videos of advanced robots: 

Festo's robotic elephant trunk arm

http://www.festo.com/cms/en_corp/9655_10219.htm

Then the students interacted with some simple animals robots:

 

Afterwards we discussed the movement of each robot and compared it the the real animal.

 We then learned about automata: a non-electric machine or robot.
 There are many FANTASTIC examples of these out there:

Theo Jansen's Strandbeests
http://www.strandbeest.com/photos.php

We watched some videos and then interacted with one of our own:

 

Then we made ones to take home out of paper:

 

AIR & SEA-

Again, we started with biomimicry:

(image from: http://www.mnn.com/earth-matters/wilderness-resources/photos/7-amazing-examples-of-biomimicry/whale-turbine)

And then moved onto advanced robotics with some videos:

Festo's robotic bird

http://www.festo.com/cms/en_corp/11369_11378.htm#id_11378

Festo's robotic air ray

http://www.festo.com/cms/en_corp/9789.htm

Then we explored a flying/swimming robot first hand:

 

Yes, the kids piloted at helium filled zombie shark.

Then we made some "flying" automata of our own in the form of bird puppets that flapped their wings when you pulled a string attached to their bellies and paper airplane/glider birds:

 

 More resources and information:

biomimicry- http://www.mnn.com/earth-matters/wilderness-resources/photos/7-amazing-examples-of-biomimicry/copying-mother-nature

http://www.livescience.com/28873-cool-technologies-inspired-by-nature.html

http://mentalfloss.com/article/22702/10-technologies-we-stole-animal-kingdom

land robots used: several inexpensive wind-up toys purchased at Brookside Toy and Science (http://www.brooksidetoyandscience.com/) and U.S.Toy (http://www.ustoy.com/)

Brush Bots from MakerShed: http://www.makershed.com/Build_your_own_scuttling_BrushBot_p/msbb.htm

Horse: http://www.robotshop.com/tamiya-mechanical-racehorse-2.html (I like this because it's a kit so you can assemble with the class if you have the time and it's transparent so you can see the gears, motor, etc.)

Various HexBugs: http://www.hexbug.com/

Automata info: http://www.mechanical-toys.com/
http://www.theinventionofhugocabret.com/about_hugo_auto.htm
Cardboard Rhino: http://www.kineticcreatures.com/
Penguin automata pattern: http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0312566697/ref=oh_details_o04_s00_i02?ie=UTF8&psc=1
Arthur Ganson makes amazing machines/artworks- some with motors, some without: http://www.arthurganson.com/
This is a puppet like no other and I just had to include it: http://www.warhorseonstage.com/puppetry

Zombie shark: http://www.thinkgeek.com/product/f030/

some other animal/technology crossover that are awesome! (dolphins and orangutan using tech to communicate with humans.):
http://boingboing.net/2010/06/01/dolphin-uses-ipad-as.html
http://www.speakdolphin.com/home.cfm
Apps for Apes- KC Zoo is a part of this!- http://redapes.org/multimedia/apps-for-apes/