Autonomous Microrobotic Manipulation Using Visual Servo Control

This describes the application of a visual servo control method to the microrobotic manipulation of polymer beads on a two-dimensional fluid interface. A microrobot, actuated through magnetic fields, is utilized to manipulate a non-magnetic polymer bead into a desired position. The controller utilizes multiple modes of robot actuation to address the different stages of the task. A filtering strategy employed in separation mode allows the robot to spiral from the manipuland in a fashion that promotes the manipulation positioning objective. Experiments demonstrate that our multiphase controller can be used to direct a microrobot to position a manipuland to within an average positional error of approximately 8 pixels (64 µm) over numerous trials.

Sulfonic Containing Polymer Bead Synthesized through Inverse Suspension Polymerization and Its Characteristics for Esterification Catalyst

The sulfonic containing polymer bead was synthesized using sodium p-styrenesulfonate (SSS) and N,N′-methylenebisacrylamide (MBA) through inverse suspension polymerization and evaluated as catalyst for esterification of of n-octanol and acrylic acid. The influence of some principal factors, such as combination dispersant, crosslink agent content, posttreatment methods, and porogen types, was investigated in detail. The results showed that the morphology and characteristics of polymer beads were controllable. The polymer beads with 20wt% crosslink agent showed the best catalysis ability achieving almost 96% esterification conversion at the first time and 80% after 5 cycles.

A Buoyant, Microstructured Polymer Substrate for Photocatalytic Degradation Applications

Microbubble fabrication of poly(dimethylsiloxane) (PDMS) beads with incorporated TiO2 provides a low-density, microstructured photocatalyst that is buoyant in water. This approach surmounts many of the challenges traditionally encountered in the generation of buoyant photocatalysts, an area which is critical for the implementation of widespread environmental cleaning of organic pollutants in water resources. Because the incorporation into the polymer bead surface is done at low temperatures, the crystal structure of TiO2 is unaltered, ensuring high-quality photocatalytic activity, while PDMS is well-established as biocompatible, temperature stable, and simple to produce. The photocatalyst is shown to degrade methylene blue faster than other buoyant, TiO2-based photocatalysts, and only an order of magnitude less than direct suspension of an equivalent amount of photocatalyst in solution, even though the photocatalyst is only present at the surface of the solution. The reusability of the TiO2/PDMS beads is also strong, showing no depreciation in photocatalytic activity after five consecutive degradation trials.