Modern materials are enabling engineers to take a fresh look at the idea of aircraft that can flex, twist or change shape to make them more maneuverable. NASA and the Defense Department are funding research programs to explore ideas.
Scientists hope to gain a better understanding of the basic physics of the components and subsystems that will be needed for the next generation of aircraft. The research includes evaluating flexible-skin concepts that have been proposed to enable wings to change shape, improving tools for simulating how morphing structures behave in flight, and looking at using devices within the wing skins to recover or “harvest” energy as the wings move.
I have toyed with a concept like this for years for surgical endoscopy tools. I can imagine two scenarios:
1) first is the concept of assembling tools inside a body cavity. I first thought of this when I was developing tools for microlaparoscopy (surgery with 2mm instruments) in the mid-90’s. Since I could not get many instruments I needed in that size we thought about somehow assembling them inside the body
2) a morphing instrument just like these aircraft. We are so fixated on static instruments. There is no reason we should think so conventionally. Why not develop an instrument that can change its configuration to meet different needs.
Just like the transformers surgical tools can be mutifunction in the future.
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2 users responded in this post
Cool post…
It’s fascinating to me as a writer to contemplate how the human imagination seems limited to our bodies. Our inventions/robots are aimed for human appearance, our tools seek to approximate, enhance or replace our existing limbs, and we evaluate the worth and intelligence of other creatures against our own.
Our bodies are our original frame of reference. How do we get past that in our imaginations?
Michele
This is exactlt my point. see my post on robots with whiskers
http://docinthemachine.com/2006/10/05/new-robots-with-whiskers-next-cut-of-their-hands/
“Too many of hte medical robots are build on a humanoid model and we need to expand our thinking to designs that complement not imitate our bodies. I don’t want to see medical robots with hands I want to see graspers and claws and insect limbs and things that enable me to do what my body cannot.”
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