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Micromachines
Special Issues
Imaging-Guided Intelligent Micromachines
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Imaging-Guided Intelligent Micromachines

A special issue of Micromachines (ISSN 2072-666X). This special issue belongs to the section "E：Engineering and Technology".

Deadline for manuscript submissions: closed (10 October 2022) | Viewed by 12926

Special Issue Editors

Dr. Qianqian Wang

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Guest Editor
Jiangsu Key Laboratory for Design and Manufacture of Micro-Nano Biomedical Instruments, School of Mechanical Engineering, Southeast University, Nanjing 211000, China
Interests: milli-/micro-/nanorobotics; collective behaviors; magnetic actuation; ultrasound imaging; swarm control; self-assembly; medical robotics; integration of medical imaging and actuation systems
Special Issues, Collections and Topics in MDPI journals
Dr. Lidong Yang

E-Mail Website
Guest Editor
Department of Mechanical and Automation Engineering, The Chinese University of Hong Kong, Hong Kong SAR 999077, China
Interests: microrobotics; magnetic actuation; motion control; automation at micro/nanoscale; microrobots for biomedical applications
Special Issues, Collections and Topics in MDPI journals
Prof. Dr. Tiantian Xu

E-Mail Website
Guest Editor
Shenzhen Institute of Advanced Technology, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Shenzhen 518055, China
Interests: small-scale robots; soft robots; magnetic control; path planning; autonomous navigation
Prof. Dr. Huaping Wang

E-Mail Website
Guest Editor
Intelligent Robotics Institute, School of Mechatronical Engineering, Beijing Institute of Technology, Beijing 100081, China
Interests: micro-nano robotics; micro-nano manipulation; biofabrication; micro-nano robots for biomedical application

Special Issue Information

Dear Colleagues,

In recent years, micromachines ranging from centi-/millimeter scale to micro-/nanometer scale have shown their enormous potential to pave the way for approaching a wide variety of tasks intelligently, such as micromanipulation, biosensing, and targeted delivery in a controlled, autonomous manner. To build an intelligent micromachine-embedded system, multidisciplinary efforts are needed in the design/fabrication of micromachines (material, structure, functionalization), actuation systems and control algorithms, processing of image feedback, and the integration of imaging and actuation/control systems, including hardware, software, and autonomous control algorithms. The system integration is also required for controlling multiple micromachines and even collective/swarming micromachines. This research topic aims to attract researchers from different disciplines of science and engineering to bring more intelligence to micromachines. This Special Issue highlights the recent advances in imaging-guided intelligent micromachines. As a multidisciplinary research topic, this Special Issue welcomes contributions of interdisciplinary expertise from multiple fields, including but not limited to research/review articles focusing on new types of design/fabrication of micromachines, imaging-guided autonomous actuation, design and/or validation of actuation and control systems, system integration for intelligent navigation, and micromachine-enabled tasks completion in related fields, such as micromanipulation, targeted delivery, and smart sensing. This Special Issue also seeks to publish recent advances in multi-agent control and collective behaviors of micromachines.

We hope this Special Issue will serve as an open platform to collect contributions that could attract attention from researchers in related research fields. We look forward to receiving your submissions to the Special Issue!

Dr. Qianqian Wang
Dr. Lidong Yang
Prof. Dr. Tiantian Xu
Prof. Dr. Huaping Wang
Guest Editors

Manuscript Submission Information

Manuscripts should be submitted online at www.mdpi.com by registering and logging in to this website. Once you are registered, click here to go to the submission form. Manuscripts can be submitted until the deadline. All submissions that pass pre-check are peer-reviewed. Accepted papers will be published continuously in the journal (as soon as accepted) and will be listed together on the special issue website. Research articles, review articles as well as short communications are invited. For planned papers, a title and short abstract (about 100 words) can be sent to the Editorial Office for announcement on this website.

Submitted manuscripts should not have been published previously, nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere (except conference proceedings papers). All manuscripts are thoroughly refereed through a single-blind peer-review process. A guide for authors and other relevant information for submission of manuscripts is available on the Instructions for Authors page. Micromachines is an international peer-reviewed open access monthly journal published by MDPI.

Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 2600 CHF (Swiss Francs). Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.

Keywords

  • imaging-guided autonomous actuation/navigation
  • small-scale robots
  • system integration
  • machine intelligence
  • soft robotics
  • multi-agent control
  • swarm control
  • micromanipulation
  • medical imaging

Published Papers (5 papers)

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Editorial

Jump to: Research, Review

3 pages, 252 KiB  
Editorial
Imaging-Guided Micromachines: Towards Intelligent Systems
by Qianqian Wang
Micromachines 2022, 13(11), 2016; https://0-doi-org.brum.beds.ac.uk/10.3390/mi13112016 - 18 Nov 2022
Viewed by 927
Abstract
Micromachines with controllable motion, deformation, and collective behaviors provide advanced methods for performing tasks that traditional machines have difficulty completing thanks to the development of small-scale robotics, nanotechnology, biocompatible materials, and imaging techniques [...] Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Imaging-Guided Intelligent Micromachines)
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Research

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11 pages, 2945 KiB  
Article
Controllable Melting and Flow of Ag in Self-Formed Amorphous Carbonaceous Shell for Nanointerconnection
by Zhiqiang Yu, Qing Shi, Huaping Wang, Junyi Shang, Qiang Huang and Toshio Fukuda
Micromachines 2022, 13(2), 213; https://0-doi-org.brum.beds.ac.uk/10.3390/mi13020213 - 29 Jan 2022
Cited by 1 | Viewed by 2116
Abstract
Nanointerconnection has been selected as a promising method in the post-Moore era to realize device miniaturization and integration. Even with many advances, the existing nanojoining methods still need further developments to meet the three-dimensional nanostructure construction requirements of the next-generation devices. Here, we [...] Read more.
Nanointerconnection has been selected as a promising method in the post-Moore era to realize device miniaturization and integration. Even with many advances, the existing nanojoining methods still need further developments to meet the three-dimensional nanostructure construction requirements of the next-generation devices. Here, we proposed an efficient silver (Ag)-filled nanotube fabrication method and realized the controllable melting and ultrafine flow of the encapsulated silver at a subfemtogram (0.83 fg/s) level, which presents broad application prospects in the interconnection of materials in the nanometer or even subnanometer. We coated Ag nanowire with polyvinylpyrrolidone (PVP) to obtain core–shell nanostructures instead of the conventional well-established nanotube filling or direct synthesis technique, thus overcoming obstacles such as low filling rate, discontinuous metalcore, and limited filling length. Electromigration and thermal gradient force were figured out as the dominant forces for the controllable flow of molten silver. The conductive amorphous carbonaceous shell formed by pyrolyzing the insulative PVP layer was also verified by energy dispersive spectroscopy (EDS), which enabled the continued outflow of the internal Ag. Finally, a reconfigurable nanointerconnection experiment was implemented, which opens the way for interconnection error correction in the fabrication of nanoelectronic devices. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Imaging-Guided Intelligent Micromachines)
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11 pages, 1011 KiB  
Article
A Digitized Representation of the Modified Prandtl–Ishlinskii Hysteresis Model for Modeling and Compensating Piezoelectric Actuator Hysteresis
by Chao Zhou, Chen Feng, Yan Naing Aye and Wei Tech Ang
Micromachines 2021, 12(8), 942; https://0-doi-org.brum.beds.ac.uk/10.3390/mi12080942 - 10 Aug 2021
Cited by 10 | Viewed by 2235
Abstract
Piezoelectric actuators are widely used in micromanipulation and miniature robots due to their rapid response and high repeatability. The piezoelectric actuators often have undesired hysteresis. The Prandtl–Ishlinskii (PI) hysteresis model is one of the most popular models for modeling and compensating the hysteresis [...] Read more.
Piezoelectric actuators are widely used in micromanipulation and miniature robots due to their rapid response and high repeatability. The piezoelectric actuators often have undesired hysteresis. The Prandtl–Ishlinskii (PI) hysteresis model is one of the most popular models for modeling and compensating the hysteresis behaviour. This paper presents an alternative digitized representation of the modified Prandtl–Ishlinskii with the dead-zone operators (MPI) hysteresis model to describe the asymmetric hysteresis behavior of piezoelectric actuators. Using a binary number with n digits to represent the classical Prandtl–Ishlinskii hysteresis model with n elementary operators, the inverse model can be easily constructed. A similar representation of the dead-zone operators is also described. With the proposed digitized representation, the model is more intuitive and the inversion calculation is avoided. An experiment with a piezoelectric stacked linear actuator is conducted to validate the proposed digitized MPI hysteresis model and it is shown that it has almost the same performance as compared to the classical representation. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Imaging-Guided Intelligent Micromachines)
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Review

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17 pages, 5306 KiB  
Review
Evolving from Laboratory Toys towards Life-Savers: Small-Scale Magnetic Robotic Systems with Medical Imaging Modalities
by Jiachen Zhang
Micromachines 2021, 12(11), 1310; https://0-doi-org.brum.beds.ac.uk/10.3390/mi12111310 - 26 Oct 2021
Cited by 7 | Viewed by 2583
Abstract
Small-scale magnetic robots are remotely actuated and controlled by an externally applied magnetic field. These robots have a characteristic size ranging from several millimetres down to a few nanometres. They are often untethered in order to access constrained and hard-to-reach space buried deep [...] Read more.
Small-scale magnetic robots are remotely actuated and controlled by an externally applied magnetic field. These robots have a characteristic size ranging from several millimetres down to a few nanometres. They are often untethered in order to access constrained and hard-to-reach space buried deep in human body. Thus, they promise to bring revolutionary improvement to minimally invasive diagnostics and therapeutics. However, existing research is still mostly limited to scenarios in over-simplified laboratory environment with unrealistic working conditions. Further advancement of this field demands researchers to consider complex unstructured biological workspace. In order to deliver its promised potentials, next-generation small-scale magnetic robotic systems need to address the constraints and meet the demands of real-world clinical tasks. In particular, integrating medical imaging modalities into the robotic systems is a critical step in their evolution from laboratory toys towards potential life-savers. This review discusses the recent efforts made in this direction to push small-scale magnetic robots towards genuine biomedical applications. This review examines the accomplishment achieved so far and sheds light on the open challenges. It is hoped that this review can offer a perspective on how next-generation robotic systems can not only effectively integrate medical imaging methods, but also take full advantage of the imaging equipments to enable additional functionalities. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Imaging-Guided Intelligent Micromachines)
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25 pages, 10013 KiB  
Review
A Review of Microrobot’s System: Towards System Integration for Autonomous Actuation In Vivo
by Zhongyi Li, Chunyang Li, Lixin Dong and Jing Zhao
Micromachines 2021, 12(10), 1249; https://0-doi-org.brum.beds.ac.uk/10.3390/mi12101249 - 15 Oct 2021
Cited by 23 | Viewed by 3880
Abstract
Microrobots have received great attention due to their great potential in the biomedical field, and there has been extraordinary progress on them in many respects, making it possible to use them in vivo clinically. However, the most important question is how to get [...] Read more.
Microrobots have received great attention due to their great potential in the biomedical field, and there has been extraordinary progress on them in many respects, making it possible to use them in vivo clinically. However, the most important question is how to get microrobots to a given position accurately. Therefore, autonomous actuation technology based on medical imaging has become the solution receiving the most attention considering its low precision and efficiency of manual control. This paper investigates key components of microrobot’s autonomous actuation systems, including actuation systems, medical imaging systems, and control systems, hoping to help realize system integration of them. The hardware integration has two situations according to sharing the transmitting equipment or not, with the consideration of interference, efficiency, microrobot’s material and structure. Furthermore, system integration of hybrid actuation and multimodal imaging can improve the navigation effect of the microrobot. The software integration needs to consider the characteristics and deficiencies of the existing actuation algorithms, imaging algorithms, and the complex 3D working environment in vivo. Additionally, considering the moving distance in the human body, the autonomous actuation system combined with rapid delivery methods can deliver microrobots to specify position rapidly and precisely. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Imaging-Guided Intelligent Micromachines)
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