Abstract
This paper presents hydrogel microrobots (100 \(\upmu \text {m}\)) that are directed to specific locations in their environment by an automated platform. The microrobots are actuated by focused laser light and crawl in aqueous environments. The platform consists of a stage, manipulated by stepper drivers and controlled by a Raspberry PI 4. This positions the laser light in the desired locations to move microrobots towards a goal location. The microrobot localisation is done via a microscope camera and repetitive usage of a template matching algorithm. Instead of a path planning algorithm, the optimal position for the laser is chosen before every step so that the disk reaches the goal as fast as possible.
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Acknowledgements
Financial support from specific university research (MSMT No 21-SVV/2020). Financial support from MEYS INTER-EXCELLENCE project LTAIN19007. Financial support from Junior GACR project nr. 18-19170Y. I. Rehor acknowledges his J.E. Purkyne fellowship.
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Vrba, J., Maslen, C., Rehor, I., Mares, J. (2021). An Automated Platform for Microrobot Manipulation. In: Herrero, Á., Cambra, C., Urda, D., Sedano, J., Quintián, H., Corchado, E. (eds) 15th International Conference on Soft Computing Models in Industrial and Environmental Applications (SOCO 2020). SOCO 2020. Advances in Intelligent Systems and Computing, vol 1268. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-57802-2_25
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