British defence company BAE Systems is to lead a research team tasked to build a variety of electronic bugs for use by the military.
Researchers have signed an agreement to begin developing robotic bugs to assist the military. Photo: Artist\'s impression of a robotic bug. Credit: BAE Systems
Known as the MAST alliance (Micro Autonomous Systems and Technology), the team will develop the miniature robots based on spiders, snakes, dragonflies and butterflies to slide, walk or crawl over enemy lines.
BAE's $38 million agreement with the U.S. Army Research Laboratory will see research into the feasibility of the development of prototypes for use in difficult terrain such as mountains and caves, and would be fitted with sensors that would be able to detect the presence of chemical, biological or radioactive weapons.
They would be fitted with cameras and which would beam back information to their operator via a hand-held computer, a company statement said.
"[BAE] will create an autonomous, multifunctional collection of miniature intelligence-gathering robots that can operate in places too inaccessible or dangerous for humans," it said.
“Robotic platforms extend the warfighter's senses and reach, providing operational capabilities that would otherwise be costly, impossible, or deadly to achieve,” said Dr. Joseph Mait, MAST cooperative agreement manager for the Army Research Laboratory. “The MAST alliance is a highly collaborative effort, with each partner from government, academia, and industry playing a significant role.”
BAE said as well as its military uses, the robots will provide the basis for future advances in such areas as small-scale aeromechanics and ambulation; propulsion; sensing, processing and communications; navigation and control; microdevices and integration; platform packaging; and systems architectures.
“The technologies that will be developed under MAST represent capabilities and techniques that will influence nearly all of the products that BAE Systems will develop and produce in the future,” said Steve Scalera, MAST program manager for BAE Systems in Merrimack, New Hampshire. “We and our alliance partners have committed our brightest minds to make the MAST program a success.”
The alliance has four principal members leading its own designated area: BAE Systems will lead Microsystems Integration, the University of Michigan will lead Microelectronics, the University of Maryland will lead Microsystem Mechanics, and the University of Pennsylvania will lead Processing for Autonomous Operation.
Others participating in one or more of the research areas are : the University of California at Berkeley, the California Institute of Technology and the Jet Propulsion Laboratory, the Georgia Institute of Technology, the University of New Mexico, and North Carolina Agricultural and Technical State University.
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