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Tiny but Mighty: UC Berkeley’s Micro-Robot Takes Flight with Magnetic Power

There’s a very popular saying that states “A little goes a long way.” That saying is exemplified through the University of California, Berkeley’s new smallest robot. Weighing in at just 21 milligrams and only being 9.4 millimeters in size, it is the smallest robot in the world that is capable of controllable flight.

Inspired by the movements of bumblebees, Liwei Lin, professor of mechanical engineering at UC Berkeley, aimed to create a robot that could mimic their precision, stating that “Bees exhibit remarkable aeronautical abilities, such as navigation, hovering, and pollination, that artificial flying robots of similar scale fail to do.” Typically, flight is only achievable in robots through motors, propellers, and electronics for flight control. These components prove to be a challenge to cram into such a miniscule frame. However, this robot is powered by external magnetic fields, with its body built to resemble a propeller, and has two magnets of opposite attraction attached, which provide the robot with the necessary lift to take off.

Lau, Adam. Campus Professor Liwei Lin Holds the Robot, Which Is Able to Pick up and Distribute Pollen and Nectar When Flown into Flowers. *DailyCal.org*, 2025

Magnetic force is caused by the rotation of electric charges, which creates an invisible force that can attract or repel other magnetic materials. This force creates an external magnetic field, which attracts and repels the magnet within the robot, spinning the propeller and causing the robot to fly. In this case, the field is generated by an electromagnetic field coil. By altering the strength of the magnetic field, the flight path of the robot can be accurately controlled.

With such a small frame, the possibilities are endless. One of the most promising applications is artificial pollination, as mentioned by Wei Yue, co-author of the study and Ph.D. candidate. “This flying robot can be wirelessly controlled to approach and hit a designated target, mimicking the mechanism of pollination as a bee collects nectar and flies away,” states Lin. This can be instrumental in supplementing global pollination. Trends have shown that populations of bees — who are the #1 pollinators in the world — have been steadily declining. If enough of these robots are produced, it could counteract the decline of the bee population. This is just one of the many uses. The next smallest size of robot is about 2.8 cm. This is over 3 times the size of the UC Berkeley model. The miniscule form of this robot makes it highly beneficial in rescue situations, as it will be able to squeeze into spaces previously deemed too small to fit into. They can also be useful in the field of medicine, with Yue stating that “They could potentially be used in minimally invasive surgery because we could inject a number of them into the body and have them cooperate together to form stents, ablate clots or do other tasks.”

Lau, Adam, and Berkeley Engineering. “The Robot Was Designed to Mimic the Flight Behavior of Insects like Bumblebees.,” UC Berkeley News, 2025

Due to the nature of the frame, it is not possible for the robot to adjust its movements instantaneously, as on-board sensors are not able to fit. This means it cannot adapt to any unexpected changes or obstacles in its flight path. So, events like strong wind or rain can knock the robot off course. However, the scientists at UC Berkeley plan to further develop this technology, with Yue stating “In the future, we will try to add active control, which would allow us to change the robot’s attitude and position in real time.” Another drawback is that the magnetic field required to lift the robot is quite strong. This can be corrected by further shrinking the size of the robot down to about 1mm. This will make it light enough to be carried by weaker fields made from waves such as radio waves.

Innovation knows no bounds with UC Berkeley’s new smallest robot. Despite the challenges, this robot shows that big things can truly come from small packages. From saving the environment, to enhancing medical practices, to performing rescue missions, the possibilities are endless.

References:

Jacobs, Skye. “Miniature Robot Takes Flight Using Magnetic Fields, No Onboard Power.” TechSpot, 3 Apr. 2025, www.techspot.com/news/107394-miniature-robot-takes-flight-using-magnetic-fields-no.html. Accessed 11 Apr. 2025.

Manke, Kara. “UC Berkeley Engineers Create World’s Smallest Wireless Flying Robot – Berkeley News.” Berkeley News, 28 Mar. 2025, news.berkeley.edu/2025/03/28/uc-berkeley-engineers-create-worlds-smallest-wireless-flying-robot/. Accessed 11 Apr. 2025.

Trovato, Roman. “UC Berkeley Engineers Create World’s Smallest Wireless Flying Robot.” Www.dailycal.org, 2 Apr. 2025, www.dailycal.org/news/campus/research-and-ideas/uc-berkeley-engineers-create-world-s-smallest-wireless-flying-robot/article_be09b0eb-5f5e-48a4-892c-b92cda6064ec.html. Accessed 11 Apr. 2025.

Italian Scientists “Freeze” Light to Make a Supersolid for the First Time

Must Read, Science, Technology / By Malia Hopper

Introduction:

When most people think of light, they may think of things like rays of sunlight or what they see when they flip on a light switch, but they definitely don’t think of it as a solid, and they shouldn’t have, until now.

On March 5, 2025, Italian researchers published a paper in the Nature Journal about how they “froze” laser light into a supersolid that has extraordinary properties.

A supersolid is a state of matter where particles condense to make crystalline solids but they move as if they are a liquid without viscosity (internal friction). In order to be formed, it has to be cooled to almost absolute zero. According to Bob Yirka, “a supersolid is a seemingly contradictory material- it is defined as rigid, but also has superfluidity, in which a liquid flows without friction.”

History of Research in Supersolids:

In the 1960s, supersolids were first predicted and they were first observed in 2017, but only in special gases.

They were also observed in 2024 by physicists in China. In order to form this supersolid, scientists had a compound of atoms which were positioned in triangular lattices which, when in a magnetic field, spin the same way. However, when they are not in a magnetic field, the atoms try to have a spin that opposes the spin of neighboring atoms. That’s where the triangle shaping comes in because it limits how many ways the atoms can orient themselves. With this shaping, researchers predicted that a supersolid with this material was possible, but only under the proper conditions. So, they put the material in an apparatus that allowed them to see the spin states and transitions of the atoms. After comparing several results to different theoretical calculations, they came to the conclusion that it was a supersolid.

How Light was Turned into a Supersolid:

At CNR Nanotec, Institute of Nanotechnology, in Lecce, Italy, Antonia Gianfate and Davide Nigro led a team of scientists with the goal of “freezing” light. However, the researchers didn’t simply lower the temperature to “freeze” light. Instead, they used quantum techniques such as using a photonic semiconductor platform that conducted photons similarly to how electrons are usually conducted.

To make a supersolid, the scientists fired their laser at gallium arsenide that had special ridges. When the light hit the ridges, it interacted with it and made polaritons (hybrid particles) that the ridges constrained, forcing the polaritons to become a supersolid.

The amount of photons (particles of light) increased and satellite condensates formed, which indicated that it was a supersolid. Since these condensates had opposite wavenumbers while having the same energy and having a specific spatial structure, it was confirmed that it was in a supersolid state.

Conclusion:

This recent breakthrough is a big step forward in the research into supersolids and the quantum world. In the future, supersolids could be crucial to doing things such as making more stable quantum computers and improving energy storage and materials.

The ability to “freeze” particles of light may seem to be something out of a science fiction book, but in 2025 it is the reality and this revolutionizing experiment will make supersolids easier to study so scientists can continue unlocking the secrets of the quantum realm.

References:

ET Online. (2025, March 12). Scientists freeze light: Researchers discover a rare state of matter where it flows like liquid but holds shape like a solid. Economic Times. Retrieved March 15, 2025, from https://economictimes.indiatimes.com/news/new-updates/scientists-freeze-light-researchers-discover-a-rare-state-of-matter-where-it-flows-like-liquid-but-holds-shape-like-a-solid/articleshow/118928851.cms

HT News Desk. (2025, March 14). Scientists manage to freeze light, convert it into a solid: Here’s how they did it. Hindustan Times. Retrieved March 15, 2025, from https://www.hindustantimes.com/world-news/us-news/scientists-manage-to-freeze-light-convert-it-into-a-solid-heres-how-they-did-it-101741943981846.html

Pine, D. (2025, March 13). Scientists turn light into a ‘supersolid’ for the 1st time ever: What that means, and why it matters. Live Science. Retrieved March 15, 2025, from https://www.livescience.com/physics-mathematics/scientists-turn-light-into-a-supersolid-for-the-1st-time-ever-what-that-means-and-why-it-matters

Yirka, B. (2024, January 29). The first observation of a material exhibiting a super solid phase of matter. Phys.org. Retrieved March 15, 2025, from https://phys.org/news/2024-01-material-supersolid-phase.html#google_vignette

Yirka, B. (2025, March 6). Laser light made into a supersolid for the first time. Phys.org. Retrieved March 15, 2025, from https://phys.org/news/2025-03-laser-supersolid.html#google_vignette

Breaking the Mold: the Slime Mold That is Forcing Researchers to Rethink What it Means to Think

Biology, Medicine / By Malia Hopper

Meet the Blob:

In 1958, the horror movie classic The Blob took the world by storm, depicting a large blob that had intelligence and had a hunger for people. What if that blob exists, intelligence and all, and its favorite food is oatmeal? This blob is called slime mold, and it is changing scientist’s very idea of intelligence. Not only can this unicellular organism make decisions, but it can learn from its mistakes. With new revolutionary discoveries being made with it, the possibilities of what we can do with it are endless, from having it solve problems it took humans decades to figure out, to computing, and even to medicine.

Despite the name, slime mold is not mold at all. Instead, it is a protist. Protists are kind of the junk drawer of classifications since it is what something is classified if scientists have no clue what else to call it.

There are more than 900 types of slime mold and over 720 sexes. Its scientific name, Physarum polycephalum, means “many headed slime,” which is fitting given how the slime mold branches out to traverse its environment. It’s also fitting because it is made up of thousands of individual nuclei who come together to make a super-cell that makes decisions to benefit the whole group. They are also extremely versatile creatures and can live in almost any environment, from jungles to the arctic and even to outer space on the International Space Station.

Slime Mold in Technology and Engineering:

At Hokkaido University in Japan, a team put slime mold in a maze and put food at two points. The slime mold made a connection between these two points and retracted itself from areas where there was no food. Even though there were several ways to get through the maze, the smile mold always found the shortest route.

To expand this experiment, they put oats at every major city on a map of Japan. They then put slime mold on this map, and within two days the slime mold had created a route that was nearly identical to the transportation network it had taken engineers more than 100 years to figure out. Now, civil engineers can use slime mold to figure out the most efficient routes faster than any human could.

In the UK, scientists created Plasmobot, a computer that runs on oak flakes and slime mold. This computer can do math problems and pull or push objects all by the power of slime mold.

Another application to technology is using slime mold to create accessible biosensors that enable citizen scientists and students to be able to gain access to and use sensors affordably. In Europe, the project PHYSENSE made a prototype biosensor that does exactly that. The prototype uses slime mold’s response to stimuli to control the sensor. In the future, these sensors could be applied to security, the discovery of drugs, food safety, and monitoring the environment.

Slime Mold in Physics and Medicine:

Even NASA has “hired” slime mold to help it tackle the challenging physics problems. They found that there could be a cosmic web throughout the universe that is mainly made of dark matter, a mysterious substance that can’t be seen. When observing this cosmic web and slime mold, NASA claimed that “there is an uncanny resemblance between the two networks: one crafted by biological evolution, and the other by the primordial force of gravity.”

So, NASA made a slime-mold inspired computer algorithm that they applied to data about nearby galaxies. This created a 3-D map of dark matter filaments in the surrounding universe.

For medicine, biophysicists in Singapore and Germany looked at slime mold’s patterns and found that the way it grows is remarkably similar to a tumor, allowing them to study how tumors supply themselves with blood. This lets them create new solutions that will cut off a tumor’s blood supply, stopping it from growing and eventually killing it.

Source: Murugan, N., Levin Lab, Tufts University, & Wyss Institute at Harvard University. (2021). *Slime mold sample exploring a petri dish*. Harvard Magazine.

Rethinking Intelligence:

When you think about the word intelligence, what comes to mind? Is it the ability to make decisions? To remember? To problem solve? Maybe you think that the most inherent part of intelligence is the ability to think, most likely with a brain. Before slime mold, almost everyone, including scientists, believed that to be intelligent something had to have a way to think. Now, slime mold is sparking debates because it can do everything listed above without a brain or even neurons.

For example, slime mold was once exposed to the cold every half an hour. When it encountered the cold, it would slow its growth to conserve energy. Then, scientists stopped exposing the slime mold to the cold, but it had remembered the timing and anticipated it, showing that it has some sort of memory.

Harvard also found that slime mold can sense objects before even coming into contact with them. To discover this, they put three glass disks on one side of a petri dish and one glass disk on the other. The majority of the time, the slime mold strongly favored the side with three glass disks, but only when the disks were put side by side. When stacked, the slime mold showed no preference, leading the scientist to determine that slime mold decided where to go in this instance based on the amount of the horizon the glass disks took up. This begs the questions: how does the sightless slime mold make these decisions and why?

In the end, there is a lot more research to be done about this confusing protist. Whether you think that it is intelligent or not though, one thing is for certain, and that is that this unicellular organism is changing society for the better.

References:

Barnett, H. (2014, July 17). What humans can learn from semi-intelligent slime. TED Talks. Retrieved March 11, 2025, from https://www.ted.com/talks/heather_barnett_what_humans_can_learn_from_semi_intelligent_slime/transcript

Bland, E. (2009, September 8). Plasmobot computer runs on slime mold. NBC News. Retrieved March 11, 2025, from https://www.nbcnews.com/id/wbna32736017

Shrourou, A. (2019, April 16). Using slime mold to produce accessible biosensors. News Medical. Retrieved March 11, 2025, from https://www.news-medical.net/news/20190415/Using-slime-mold-to-produce-accessible-biosensors.aspx

Slime Molds Help Show How Cancer Grows. (2012, August 24). WIRED. Retrieved March 11, 2025, from https://www.wired.com/2012/08/slime-molds-cancer-growth/

Slime Mold Simulations Used to Map Dark Matter Holding Universe Together. (2020, March 10). NASA Science. Retrieved March 11, 2025, from https://science.nasa.gov/missions/hubble/slime-mold-simulations-used-to-map-dark-matter-holding-universe-together/Walecki, N. (2021). Can Slime Molds Think? Harvard Magazine. Retrieved March 11, 2025, from https://www.harvardmagazine.com/2021/10/right-now-can-slime-molds-think

Could the New State of Matter be the Future of Quantum Computing?

Science, Technology / By Malia Hopper

Definitions

Fermions- particles that have a mass and are one of matter’s two main building blocks.
- Composite fermions- combinations of these fermions.
Superconductors- according to Cade Metz of the New York Times, “are materials that conduct electricity without losing the energy they are transmitting.”
Majorana- a particle that is its own antiparticle
- Antiparticles- subatomic particles that have the same masses as corresponding particles, but they have opposite charges

We’re all told growing up that the states of matter are solid, liquid, and gas. As we grow up, plasma and Bose-Einstein Condensates are added to that list, but what if I were to tell you that a new state of matter was just created, and it’s being used to advance quantum computing.

On February 19, Microsoft published a research paper in the science journal Nature, announcing that they created the Majorana-1 chip. The Majorana-1 chip is a microprocessor that uses a topological superconductor that yields particles that aren’t solid, liquid, or gas. Could this new state of matter be the key to the future of quantum computers?

History:

Thirty years ago, Jainendra Jain, a physicist at Penn State, pioneered a theory about a new state of matter. They called this theory the fractional quantum Hall effect and said that it was a liquid of composite fermions. These fermions can create a superconductor under the right conditions. Theorists then predicted that under the right conditions, these composite fermions could make a superconductor that encloses a Majorana.

Image Source: Hu, C. (2022, September 7). IBM’s quantum computer. Popular Science.

Standard Versus Quantum Computing

Normal computers use “bits.” These are the 0’s and 1’s that make up data. On the other hand, quantum bits, or qubits, can be a 0, a 1, or a superposition, such as being a 0 and a 1 simultaneously. Together, these qubits drastically increase how quickly calculations can be made. In fact, if every computer in the world worked together, it would take decades to do what a quantum computer can do in just one day.

One of the main challenges in the world of quantum computers is interference either from the environment or from within the system itself. If there is interference, qubits can collapse and cause errors by going into a definite state, meaning they would turn into only a 1 or a 0. That’s where theorists bring in these strange Majorana particles.

Theorists believed that these Majorana particles could be applied to quantum computing to make them more fault-tolerant. This happens because when there are two Majorana particles together, they either make a whole fermion or nothing, acting as the 0’s and 1’s of a standard bit. However, unlike most other qubits, Jainendra Jan says “the information here can be stored non-locally in a topological fashion.” What this means is that the two Majorana particles making up a qubit can have distance between them. Since neither of them have all the information, local interference can’t turn them on or off. So, the qubits won’t lose their data because it can correct errors as it calculates, allowing quantum computing to be used by industries in the future.

The New Quantum Computer

In 1997, Alexei Kitaev, a Russian American physicist, first came up with the idea of combining superconductors and semiconductors. Microsoft has worked toward this idea in what has been its longest-running research project by combining the superconductors most quantum computers use with the classical computer’s semiconductor’s strengths.

Experimentalists have found that in the right conditions, such as being cooled to about four hundred degrees below zero, composite fermions can pair up to form a topological superconductor that contains the highly sought-after Majorana particles.

This topological superconductor, also called a topoconductor, is the new state of matter they created. A topoconductor is formed when a superconductor and a semiconductor are cooled to extremely low temperatures and then tuned with a magnetic field.

Far from the future?

Even with this exciting news involving a new state of matter that could revolutionize quantum computing, people shouldn’t get too excited yet. In fact, Microsoft’s Majorana-1 chip doesn’t actually show that composite fermions work as qubits because Jainendra Jain says it “focuses on Majorana particles in superconductor-semiconductor hybrid nanowires, not on Majorana particles in a composite-fermion superconductor.” However, it shows that the needed measurements for a Majorana particle-based computer are possible, showing a pathway to the future.

Also, the Majorana-1 chip is still in development. It is designed to have up to one million qubits, but right now it only contains eight. Microsoft claims that it has to put one hundred qubits into the chip to make it commercially viable. They are predicting that this will come in the near future, and based on their predictions this technology may be possible by 2030.

This technology could be used to advance research, improve energy efficiency, develop medicine, and much more. Some are still skeptical about it though because these computers are extremely powerful, so in the wrong hands the technology could pose a threat to national security.

Conclusion

While some scientists try to figure out if they should be developing this technology or not, others are off to the races, with Mirosoft, Google, Intel, IBM, and several foreign governments all trying to be the first to crack the code of quantum computing.

If Microsoft’s data is verified, it could revolutionize technology and make the future of science come much sooner than originally predicted. Whether one believes we should develop this technology or not, everyone can agree that these incredible leaps in technology showcase how much we have furthered our understanding of the quantum world. Now, we just have to wait and see what the future has in store for this exciting new technology.

References:

Fiveable. (n.d.). Antiparticle. Fiveable. Retrieved March 4, 2025, from https://fiveable.me/key-terms/principles-physics-iii-thermal-physics-waves/antiparticle

Klebanov, S. (2025, February 21). New state of matter just dropped? Morning Brew. Retrieved March 4, 2025, from https://www.morningbrew.com/stories/2025/02/21/new-state-of-matter-just-dropped

Metz, C. (2025, February 19). Microsoft Says It Has Created a New State of Matter to Power Quantum Computers. The New York Times. Retrieved March 4, 2025, from https://www.nytimes.com/2025/02/19/technology/microsoft-quantum-computing-topological-qubit.html

Porschke, T. (2025, February 26). Solid, Liquid, Gas, Plasma… Topoconductor? The Log. Retrieved March 4, 2025, from https://www.thelogcchs.com/post/solid-liquid-gas-plasma-topoconductor

Unacademy. (n.d.). Fermions and Bosons. Unacademy. Retrieved March 4, 2025, from https://unacademy.com/content/upsc/study-material/physics/fermions-and-bosons/

WennersHerron, A., & Berard, A. (2025, February 26). Q&A: Will Microsoft’s quantum ‘breakthrough’ revolutionize computing? Penn State. Retrieved March 4, 2025, from https://www.psu.edu/news/research/story/qa-will-microsofts-quantum-breakthrough-revolutionize-computing

“Synthetic Biology’s Promise and Peril: Shaping the Future of Medicine

Biology, Science / By Ruby Hyland

Image Credit: https://www.technologynetworks.com/drug-discovery/blog/how-is-synthetic-biology-shaping-the-future-of-drug-discovery-340290

As a recent and ever-changing form of medicine and science, synthetic biology is paving the way for the future of medicine. Defined as a “research and engineering domain of biology where a human-designed genetic program is synthesized and transplanted into a relevant cell type from an extant organism” (A.M. Calladine, R. ter Meulen, 2013), synthetic biology offers possible solutions to some of society’s most pressing medical issues. Through DNA sequence modification and genome editing, scientists have been able to edit genetic material in living organisms with tools such as CRISPR (Clustered regularly interspaced short palindromic repeats). This ability allows scientists to provide organisms with genetic tools that nature has not yet apportioned. CRISPR also allows for the creation of ‘living therapeutics’ and introduction of immunity cells into the human body.

So, what does this all mean? Well, synthetically creating genetic tools has already allowed for a breakthrough in different areas of production, such as the ability for silkworms to produce spider silk, as well as genetically engineered food, such as cheese, plant-based meat, etc., some of which are already available on a market scale. This provides society with a more sustainable way of creating different materials, which may be necessary as we continue to experience the impacts of consumerism on our planet’s environment. Living therapeutics and immune cells can help treat patients with various diseases, including multiple forms of cancer, providing them with a better chance of recovery and survival. Synthetic biology also assisted in the mass production of certain COVID-19 vaccines by manufacturing the SARS-CoV-2 genome sequence.

It’s clear that an abundance of benefits derive from the usage of synthetic biology. Consequently, as with most technological advancements, there is also a profusion of risks. A majority of these risks appear to be ethical and extremely dangerous. According to The University of Oxford, synthetic biology, although promising, gives biologists a concerning way of ‘playing god.’ Misusing synthetic biology could potentially destroy existing ecosystems and undermine our crucial distinction between living organisms and machines. The loss of this distinction could be catastrophic for humans’ view on the importance of different organisms and creates an ethical concern of prioritizing machines and technology over nature and living organisms. Synthetic biology also introduces the risk of the synthesization of known human pathogens, such as Influenza or Smallpox, which could be released in much more dangerous forms than what they currently are. Although some of these associated risks are unlikely, the potential danger they inflict could be devastating.

When considering the sad reality of human greed, it is essential to question whether the findings of synthetic biology will continue to be used for good. If put into the wrong hands, the technology could cause the decimation of multiple existing species, ultimately jeopardizing the balance of our ecosystem. Synthetic biology also poses the genuine risk of bioterrorism, as creating hazardous and genetically mutated organisms could be maliciously and violently released. Control of this technology is seen more in richer first-world countries, creating an inequality regarding access and usage. This gives certain countries, such as the U.S., an extensive scientific advantage over other countries, which could be used at the expense of other nations.

It is still being determined what the future of synthetic biology holds, but it is imperative that both the benefits and drawbacks are considered. Naturally, we hope synthetic biology continues to be used for the greater of humankind, but that could very easily and swiftly change. Therefore, and when considering that we are already in the midst of multiple ethical, moral, and environmental crises, it is necessary to be aware of the information we consume and promote, specifically regarding the ongoing evolution of technology and science.

Public sees promise of synthetic biology, but wary | ZDNET

Image credit: https://www.zdnet.com/article/public-sees-promise-of-synthetic-biology-but-wary/

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