Thermally actuated untethered impact-driven locomotive microdevices

The authors have developed steerable locomotive devices as small as 30 mu m using the inertial impact drive as the thrust method. The devices consist of three-legged, thin-metal-film bimorphs designed to rest on three sharp tips with the device body curved up off the surface. Rapid, thermally induced curvature of one leg leads to stepwise translation on a low friction surface. A focused laser was used to supply energy and its parameters controlled the velocity and direction of motion of the device. (c) 2006 American Institute of Physics.