{"id":27203,"date":"2022-12-03t00:26:25","date_gmt":"2022-12-03t00:26:25","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/dev.planetforward.com\/2022\/12\/03\/the-buzz-about-robotic-bees\/"},"modified":"2023-02-24t16:52:46","modified_gmt":"2023-02-24t16:52:46","slug":"buzz-robotic-bees","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"\/\/www.getitdoneaz.com\/story\/buzz-robotic-bees\/","title":{"rendered":"the buzz about robotic bees"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
in front of hundreds of researchers at harvard university, mario vallejo-marin, ph.d., a professor of biology and environmental science at the university of sterling in scotland, stood anxiously and gave an impassioned speech about the challenges he has faced in studying bee pollination. he was looking for solutions that can aid in the fight to protect ever-declining bee biodiversity, and he was open to trying anything. however, the last thing that vallejo-marin ever expected was to fly back to scotland with the idea for a tiny robotic bee flying around in his head.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
as vallejo-marin spoke to the harvard scholars in late 2021 about his goal to use a vibrating source to conduct a controlled study on the characteristics of pollination in different species of bees, an eager hand shot up in the audience. the hand belonged to noah jafferis, ph.d., a professor of electrical and computer engineering at the university of massachusetts. jafferis felt that he could help vallejo-marin achieve his goal by using a completely novel bio-robotic bee to replicate certain types of pollination in experiments. vallejo-marin\u2019s first thought was one of skepticism, as the two researchers come from entirely different scientific backgrounds, but the more they talked, the more they realized that their interests seem to intertwine perfectly.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
in march 2022, within months of meeting each other, vallejo-marin and jafferis secured an $840,000 grant from the human frontier science program<\/a>, an organization that promotes international interdisciplinary research related to living organisms.<\/p>\n\n\n \u201cthis is one of the best pieces of news that you can receive as a scientist,\u201d vallejo-marin said, with excitement in his voice. \u201cgrant writing and getting funds in science is a very difficult process where there is a lot of chance, luck, and being in the right place at the right time.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n vallejo-marin\u2019s biology lab in scotland is filled with the deafening sound of buzzing, which shakes the entire room with high-pitched vibrations. the source of this buzzing becomes clear as vallejo-marin walks over to a large tank in the corner of the lab, looking affectionately at the hundreds of yellow and black insects flying and landing on artificial flowers. the focus of this lab is buzz pollination, which is a fairly rare and under-researched type of bee pollination that is vital to the health and fertilization of over 20,000 plant species and crops across the globe.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cbuzz pollination is used on many different plant species, including a number of crops that humans rely on for food sources such as tomatoes and blueberries,\u201d vallejo-marin said. understanding how bees do it and which species do it could improve agriculture and help explain the importance of protecting rare species to maintain bee biodiversity.<\/p>\n\n\n\n only certain bees can buzz pollinate, and only certain plants can be pollinated in this way. most bees pollinate by landing on flower petals and passively collecting pollen in the hairs on their bodies, which is then spread throughout the area as they fly. however, when the right kind of bee lands on the right kind of flower, the bee will contract the muscles in its thorax and start actively producing vibrations that make the entire flower shake. this motion causes the pollen grains inside to bounce back and forth and eventually shoot out of the flower.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cyou can see a shower, almost like a jet stream of pollen coming out of the flower,\u201d vallejo-marin said. \u201cthis happens in a fraction of a second, and it takes less than a hundred milliseconds for the bees to shake free thousands and thousands of pollen grains.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n the main challenge that vallejo-marin has faced throughout his research is determining the morphology of buzz pollinators. this information would allow him to decipher what enables buzz pollinators to biologically pollinate in this way, compared to species of bees that cannot produce buzz vibrations. <\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cwe know very little about what makes a bee buzz a certain way, whether it\u2019s size or speed or ecology or a combination of all of those factors,\u201d vallejo-marin said. he has found that it is extremely difficult to replicate the incredibly fast vibrations that a such a tiny insect produces on a flower. this is where dr. noah jafferis comes in, and this is where bee research will take a turn into the unknown.<\/p>\n\n\n\nnot all bees buzz… pollinate<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
creating the prototype<\/h2>\n\n\n\n