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January 4, 2005
Eating Bugs Powers Robot
Scientists at the University of the West of England (UWE) have designed a robot that generates it's own power by eating bugs.
The EcoBot II robot uses human sewage to attract flies, and then capture them. Once captured, bacteria in the sewage digest the fly, convert it to sugar, and then microbial fuel cells convert the sugar into electricity. The robot can digest about 3 or 4 flies in a week. A single microbial cell can generate 0.75 volts.
Future robots are expected to be powered by cellulose (cow sewage?).
[1] Fly-eating robot powers itself, December 29, 2004 Posted: 12:50 PM EST (1750 GMT). http://www.cnn.com/2004/TECH/12/27/explorers.ecobot/index.html
[2] Lakshmi Sandhana, Ecobot Eats Dead Flies for Fuel, December. 15, 2004, PT, http://www.wired.com/news/technology/0,1282,66036-2,00.html
Posted by sjc at January 4, 2005 9:00 PM
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