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Tiny robots and sensors need tiny batteries — here’s how to do it

Improve materials and architectures to shrink microscopic devices.
  1. Minshen Zhu

    1. Minshen Zhu is a senior scientist at the Institute for Integrative Nanosciences, Leibniz IFW Dresden, Germany.

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  2. Oliver G. Schmidt

    1. Oliver G. Schmidt is director at the Institute for Integrative Nanosciences, Leibniz IFW Dresden, Germany, and a professor of material systems for nanoelectronics at the Centre for Materials, Architectures and Integration of Nanomembranes (MAIN), Chemnitz University of Technology, Chemnitz, Germany.

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A tiny computer balanced on the edge of a coin

Credit: Martin Vloet/D. Blaauw, D. Sylvester & H. Kim/Michigan Micro Mote (M3)/Univ. Michigan

Smart dust is about to enter our lives1,2. Computers, sensors and robots as small as a grain of salt are being developed that can move around, detect light, sound, pressure, chemicals and magnetic fields. Less than a millimetre across and a few hundred micrometres thick, they process information and communicate wirelessly. They have a range of uses from medical diagnostics, surgery and brain monitoring to tracking butterflies and the conditions of crops.

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Nature 589, 195-197 (2021)

doi: https://doi.org/10.1038/d41586-021-00021-2

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