MIT created robotic M-Block cubes for self-assembly in a megastructure in swarm mode

The Massachusetts Institute of Technology developed six year old project into something more than simple robotic blocks that can balance on complex surfaces without any limbs to move.

The project was named "M-Block" and relies on the “three M’s”: movement (move), magnet and magic. The cubes can move horizontally, vertically, jump and take off, performing real acrobatic tricks in the air. And all this is due to the flywheel in each of them, which rotates at a speed of 20 thousand rpm. Moreover, the cube has no visible moving parts and its behavior is similar to magic. Magnets in each cube face and at its vertices allow the cubes to assemble into one meaningful structure, the shape of which is dictated by the task at hand, which is assigned to the swarm of cubes for immediate execution.

As reported at MIT, the presented M-Block design, when the directional impulse of inertia of a rotating flywheel is responsible for the movement of each cube, allows the swarm to be scaled to millions of cubes. During the process of assembling cubes in a megastructure, they will not be interfered with by “legs, arms, wheels or anything else.” Such self-assembling robots, for example, can be used in conditions of destruction of buildings to assemble stairs where they have collapsed, it is enough just to pour out the cubes in the right quantity in a certain place. However, there are many applications of this technology in everyday life, in education, in healthcare, in production and just for games.

During the assembly process, the cubes are helped by self-identification in the form of a barcode on the edges. They literally recognize each other by sight. Also, in the process of assembling the cubes, a light alarm on each of them helps. Scientists immediately abandoned radio communications and infrared communications. Radio creates mutual interference and can cause confusion when scaling a swarm, and infrared radiation can in some cases be drowned out by external heat sources. Watch the video. The actions of the dice really look like magic. However, as Arthur C. Clarke rightly noted: “Any sufficiently developed technology is indistinguishable from magic.”

Source: 3dnews.ru