Sunlight-powered sustained flight of an ultralight micro aerial vehicle.
biomechanical · Level V
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- Record sourced from PubMed, PMID 39020037.
- Also identified by DOI 10.1038/s41586-024-07609-4.
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Abstract
Limited flight duration is a considerable obstacle to the widespread application of micro aerial vehicles (MAVs)<sup>1-3</sup>, especially for ultralightweight MAVs weighing less than 10 g, which, in general, have a flight endurance of no more than 10 min (refs. <sup>1,4</sup>). Sunlight power<sup>5-7</sup> is a potential alternative to improve the endurance of ultralight MAVs, but owing to the restricted payload capacity of the vehicle and low lift-to-power efficiency of traditional propulsion systems, previous studies have not achieved untethered sustained flight of MAVs fully powered by natural sunlight<sup>8,9</sup>. Here, to address these challenges, we introduce the CoulombFly, an electrostatic flyer consisting of an electrostatic-driven propulsion system with a high lift-to-power efficiency of 30.7 g W<sup>-</sup><sup>1</sup> and an ultralight kilovolt power system with a low power consumption of 0.568 W, to realize solar-powered sustained flight of an MAV under natural sunlight conditions (920 W m<sup>-</sup><sup>2</sup>). The vehicle's total mass is only 4.21 g, within 1/600 of the existing lightest sunlight-powered aerial vehicle<sup>6</sup>.