Solar energy is a crucial factor in powering the robots of the future, and it is absolutely possible to find it in an incredible number of applications. The latest, suggestive and disturbing like few others, concerns a class of totally automated micro aircraft that fly using the movement of birds.
Prof. S.Gupta of the University of Maryland presents 'his' Robo Raven like this:
The solar cells currently cover less than half of Robo Raven's wingspan: they produce 3.6W of power on a sunny day, with an efficiency of 6% that can reach a range between 25 and 50% if combined with motors efficient. We plan to increase performances and cover a greater area of Robo Raven in its future versions.
To give 'eternal life' to this bird solar would require much more energy: real birds rely, more than on the sun, on sources of 'food' energy that are currently much more efficient.
Nature has developed incredible energy systems: for example, 1 gram of food produces 20 times the energy of one gram of current technology energy provided by the batteries. In nature solar energy it is 'captured' by trees and is not found on birds.
What if we started thinking about robots that could also draw energy from food? It will take much longer, during which nothing prevents us from continuing with the experiments that bring us closer to solar energy efficiency such that it can power robotic aircraft (or is it better to say birds?) indefinitely.
