CELLOIDS
towards cell-inspired autonomous microrobots

 

Stefano Palagi
stefano.palagi@santannapisa.it


Shrinking the Cutting Edge: Making Small-Scale Medical Robots for Humans
ICRA 2023 Workshop – Monday, May 29, 2023, London (UK)

smart nanomedicine

  • ✅ targeted delivery

  • Targeting nanoparticles to malignant tissues for improved diagnosis and therapy is a popular concept. However, after surveying the literature from the past 10 years only 0.7% (median) of the administered nanoparticle dose is found to be delivered to a solid tumour.

  •  

    ❌ systemic administration

smart nanomedicine + microrobotics

✅ targeted delivery

  +

✅ localized administration

 

  • remote control (from planet 🌍)

  • images from orbiting camera

  • no sensors on-board

 

 

  • ❌ lag, low loop frequency

  • ✅ tracking

  • ❌ poor/no obstacle avoidance

 

http://photojournal.jpl.nasa.gov/jpeg/PIA19808.jpg

 
 

  • → autonomy

  • → robot ‼️

are our microrobots robots❓

  • can we make true microscale robots❓

  • robotic functionalities on-board:

    • → self-adaptive locomotion
    • → energy harvesting from environment
    • → perception of environment
    • → (supervised) autonomy

 

 

cell-inspired particle-based
intelligent microrobots

  1. ultra-adaptive morphology
  2. self-sustained shape changes
  3. multi-gradient sensing
  4. supervised autonomous navigation
.DOI

Giant
Unilamellar
Vesicles

60:40 DOPC:Chol GUVs containing ferrofluid spontaneously oscillating
60:40 DOPC:Chol GUVs containing ferrofluid in homogeneous magnetic field

active particles

3 μm Pt-SiO2, 3% H2O2

GUVs
+
active particles

optimization of particles encapsulation in GUVs
deformability induced by hypertonic stress (300 mOsm), leading to protrusions
active particles (1.1 μm, Pt-PS) move inside protrusion (5% H2O2)

work in progress 🚧

  1. ultra-adaptive morphology
    ✅ ultra-softness,   🚧 squeezing through narrow gaps
  2. self-sustained shape changes
    ✅ self-propelled active particles,
    🚧 active particles-induced deformations,   🚧 movement in confinement
  3. multi-gradient sensing
    🚧 fuel / pH gradient sensing,   🚧 directed movement
  4. supervised autonomous navigation
    ✅ loading with magnetic particles,   🚧 magnetic + active particles,
    🚧 magnetic + active particles + gradient following
.DOI

Elisa Roberti, PhD student
Eugenia De Remigis, PhD student
Gaia Petrucci, postdoc
Jyoti Sharma, postdoc
Hilda Gomez Bernal, postdoc
Dario Cecchi, postdoc
Francesco Bianciardi, research assisant
Elisa Linda Petrocelli, research assistant

 

@MicroRobotLab

Microscale Robotics Laboratory

@microrobot.lab

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<style scoped> blockquote { margin-left: 35%; } </style>

> _I wish to build **completely autonomous mobile agents** that co-exist in the world with humans, and are seen by those humans as intelligent beings in their own right. I will call such agents Creatures. This is my intellectual motivation._ > > _I have no particular interest in applications; it seems clear to me that if my goals can be met then the **range of applications** for such Creatures will be **limited only by our (or their) imagination**._ > > <p style="font-size:0.75em; text-align:right;">RA Brooks, <em>Artificial Intelligence</em>, 1991</p>

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