New Flapping Wing Craft Can Right Itself From Any Place

Since the days of Leonardo da Vinci people have tried to build machines that fly with flapping wings like a bird or an insect. Even in the jet age the idea remains attractive because such machines could be more maneuverable than fixed-wing aircraft, and at small sizes would use less energy to hover than helicopters. Many of these so-called "ornithopters" have been built. Some of them fly well when moving forward, but so far, few do a good job of hovering in place. Our computers still can't match the complex feedback and control systems in the tiny brains of birds and bugs. But Cornell researchers have come up with a simple, inexpensive flapping wing vehicle that hovers as well as a hummingbird or a bumblebee -- and might eventually be made just as small. Potential applications include surveillance, artificial pollination and even toys. The vehicle -- built by students Floris Van Breugel and William Regan, working with Hod Lipson, Cornell associate professor of mechanical and aerospace engineering -- needs no complex control system because it is "passively stable." Tip it over and it naturally rights itself like a buoy in water. It can even be started upside down and will recover, something few conventional aircraft, including helicopters, can do. The device is described in an article in the December 2008 issue of IEEE Robotics & Automation Magazine.
http://www.physorg.com/news148236804.html

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