Scientists have created an advanced prototype of flying robot that can fly like a real bat. Making robots by following the moving style of animals or birds are known as biomimetics. Bats have always had the power to seek focus of scientists for its fascinating characteristics. This flying robot is inspired from the Brazilian free-tailed bat, fastest flying mammal on Earth.

A joint team of Engineers from California Institute of Technology (Caltech) and the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign worked together for this project. This advanced flying gadget is equipped with soft, flexible and ultra-light weight wings and an advanced chassis that consume less power than any aerial robots. Researchers published about their invention in the journal of Science Robotics.

Dr. soon-Jo Chung, a research scientist at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory and associate professor at Caltech said in a statement, “We have challenged ourselves to reverse engineer bats’ unrivaled agility with an aim to build a safe, energy-efficient soft-wing robot that can fly like a bat”. Research team named this gadget Bat-bot(B2). It is not like a quadrotor drone. Instead of using spinning propellers, B2 mimics a real bat by flapping its wings.

According to the report by Fox News, B2 can fly almost 100 feet in a straight line by flapping its wings. Researchers covered the wings with ultra thin and flexible silicon membrane which is the almost impossible to tear. The whole set up weighs only 92 grams. Dr. Chung and his team made this as light as possible to gain extra lift and propulsion.

There are some extra advantages over traditional drones, Chung explained. As it doesn't have any spinning propeller so it is safer to use in a close proximity of humans. Even it can fly through the narrow spaces. Bats use more than 40 active and passive joints to take off and fly, researchers reduced the numbers to nine( five active and four passive).

Professor Seth Hutchinson from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign told that the robot could be used to do various things. He also added, it will help architects to build construction according to the plan and it might be able to perch in a steel structure.

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