Yi-Hsuan (Nemo) Hsiao
I'm Nemo, a Ph.D. student in the Soft and Micro Robotics Lab at MIT, supervised by Prof. Kevin Yufeng Chen.
Inspired by flying animals in nature, my research aims to develop novel mechanisms/actuators and advanced control algorithms for artificial aerial robots to perform multi-functional agile maneuvers comparable to their biological counterparts.
The interdisciplinary nature of my research allows me to collaborate with material scientists, biologists, control scientists, swarm experts, applied physicists, and roboticists who provide critical insights for my research.
Prior to MIT, I stayed at CityU Hong Kong, Georgia Tech, and TU Delft throughout my undergraduate studies. more about me
Bio-inspired aerial robots at a glance
Research Projects
Damage-resilient soft flappers
Inspired by the resilience of natural bees upon injury, we developed repair techniques that enable our robots' soft artificial muscles, Dielectric Elastomer Actuators (DEAs), to sustain severe damage.
The soft actuator can thus endure piercing by up to 10 needles and a wing loss, but still generate sufficient power to attain hovering flight.
This research was published on the cover of Science Robotics.
Deep-learned robust-tube MPC
Model Predictive Control (MPC) is the state-of-the-art control technique, yet computationally expensive. We thus trained a 2-hidden-layered neural network to deep learn the MPC.
The neural net can be executed at 2 kHz in real time and perform similarly to MPC for collision recovery.
This research was awarded Outstanding Dynamics and Control Paper Finalist at ICRA 2023.
Perching on wet walls with bio-inspired adhesives
Flying is energetically expensive. To stay elevated, natural insects perch on various objects. Learning from this strategy, we developed a new passive mechanism with bio-inspired adhesives to allow the robot to stay on walls and ceilings.
This novel design enables the robot to perch on and take off from surfaces without additional actuators, under both dry and wet conditions.
With the proximity aerodynamic effect, the operation time of the robot is extended by almost a factor of four.
This research was published in Communications Engineering.
Paper | Video | Blog | Behind the Paper
Cooperative beam lifting
Natural bees fly in groups to collectively carry out complex missions. Here, we leveraged SLA printing to efficiently fabricate a swarm of 3D-printed insect-scale robots.
These sub-gram artificial drones can fly cooperatively to achieve beam lifting, a challenging task for a single robot.
This research was published in Advanced Intelligent Systems.
Yaw control of sub-gram flappers
Yaw control is inherently challenging for flapping-wing aerial robots at the insect scale.
We utilized an inclined stroke plane approach to actuate bi-directional yawing motions and performed flights to track a yaw-angle trajectory on the soft-actuated robot.
This research was published at ICRA 2023.
Firefly-inspired luminescent robot
Inspired by fireflies in nature, we embedded electroluminescent particles into our soft artificial muscles and performed flights in a dark environment.
The distinct colors emitted by individual units allow us to track robots' positions and attitudes simply with our smartphones.
This research was published in
IEEE Robotics and Automation Letters.
Ceiling effect for perching
An interesting aerodynamic phenomenon, ceiling effect, arises when a spinning propeller approaches an overhang. This proximity effect generates more thrust under the same power consumption.
We quantified this aerodynamic effect with quasi-steady model and found that we could potentially reduce the power consumption by a factor of three while perching under a ceiling.
This research was published in IROS 2018 and IEEE/ASME Transactions on Mechatronics.
Delfly Nimble Mini
Followed by the renown Delfly Nimble, we developed a scale-down version of this flapping-wing robot, Nimble Mini.
Nimble Mini has a shorter wing span (two third), larger flapping angle, and a newly-designed yawing mechanism.
Based on the controlled free flights we performed, the Nimble Mini can generate much higher yaw rate while maintaining similar roll/pitch agility compare to the original Delfly Nimble.
