Overview
- This week the teams published a Science paper and showed lab and Lake Geneva tests of the Flapping‑Wing Aerial‑Aquatic Vehicle, a roughly 250–300 g robot that swims, breaks the surface, and continues flying with the same two flexible wings.
- The robot uses neutral buoyancy, a steerable tail, and passively compliant wings that bend up to about 90% underwater to cut motor load and allow different flapping rates in water and air.
- Researchers found a narrow ‘sweet spot’ of design and motion—about an 80 cm wingspan, flapping near 5 Hz for cruising, and a roughly 70° pitch to exit the water—that produced reliable swim‑to‑flight transitions in calm conditions.
- The system is not yet autonomous and still needs work on steering, salt‑water and rough‑sea performance, corrosion resistance, and longer endurance before it can be used operationally for oceanography.
- The team released open CAD files and estimates materials cost at roughly US$300, positioning the platform as an accessible physical model for studying diving birds and as a low‑cost tool for future environmental monitoring.