A small child swallows a battery from one of his toys and parents are distressed because they don’t know how to get it out. The story is common, and many families have experienced it or at least heard of a similar case.
The solution to this problem may now have gained a new ally. That’s because Chinese researchers published in the journal Advanced Functional Materials an article about a new model of a tiny robot that resembles a slime, that toy that looks like a slime. The invention, according to the researchers, could be useful for removing objects that have somehow entered someone’s body – as in the case of an object that is swallowed by children.
Similar robot models already existed, and the authors explore some of these types in the paper. One of them is made from elastomer, which is basically silicone. This type of material is interesting because it has great adaptability to different environments, but its shape cannot be so malleable, making it not fit into such small spaces.
Another type is the robot made by means of liquid materials. This model basically has the opposite properties of the one based on elastomer: it can be quite malleable, being able to enter spaces with a diameter of 1.5 mm, but it fails to adapt to various environments.
It was from this difference between the two models that the initiative for the study emerged: to develop a robot that could combine high resistance with the ability to transit in tiny spaces.
In order to combine the two capabilities, the main method was to mix two chemical substances —borax, which is a mixture of salt with boric acid, and magnetic particles — which were later added with a type of alcohol. This combination forms the essence of the invention.
Tests were also made to verify the robot’s effectiveness when it enters different environments. Some of them, for example, involved tiny, different-shaped tubes to see if the little goo would have transit problems. The equipment still needed to prove that it could work in different spaces, such as paper, water, plastic and hydrogel, indicating its ability to be used in different spaces.
By having magnetic particles in its substance, the main use of the little robot would be to assist in the removal of tiny objects from the human body. In some images released, it is as if he swallows these materials when he walks over them.
In this way, the main contribution of the magnetic slime is to, who knows, in the future, help the work of surgeons who are faced with cases in which patients have foreign bodies. But in addition to hospitals, the little robot can also have another useful function: calming parents when they realize that their children have swallowed what they shouldn’t.
