What does the way forward for building seem like? Autonomous machines buzzing round a constructing website? Giant 3D printers extruding partitions and flooring? Looking ahead even farther, researchers on the Public University of Navarre in Spain have been experimenting with utilizing sound waves to make building materials simply float into position with none bodily interplay required.

Although nonetheless part of many fantasy flicks and magicians’ routines, levitation is not simply an phantasm. Researchers have been experimenting with utilizing ultrasonic sound waves—nicely previous the edge of human listening to—to make objects float for fairly a number of years now. Sound waves generated by ultrasonic transducers have now lifted everything from two-inch styrofoam balls to a grid of tiny particles. Even irregularly-shaped objects have been made to drift, however to this point the expertise has seen restricted real-world functions.

Researchers from the Public University of Navarre’s UpnaLab and the University of São Paulo, in Brazil, suggest using acoustic levitation as a approach to complement the speedy additive manufacturing strategies many industries now depend on, from newbie {hardware} hackers to aerospace engineers. The group created an acoustic levitator that may generate acoustic fields able to trapping and holding elongated objects like sticks and different supplies, after which connected it to a robotic arm that enables these objects to be precisely positioned and assembled onto a bigger construction with none bodily contact.

Even extra spectacular is that the levitator isn’t restricted to only manipulating stable objects. It can even choose up liquids and even supplies like glues or resins, that are then used to bond elements collectively. In a video demonstrating its capabilities, the levitator applies drops of an adhesive to a easy matchstick construction, which could be immediately hardened with a fast blast of ultraviolet mild.

In its present type, the researchers’ machine can’t be used to assemble a constructing. Its lifting capabilities are nonetheless restricted to small, light-weight objects like wood matchsticks. But that doesn’t imply it’s ineffective till it may be scaled as much as deal with bigger tasks.

Building the extremely small or detailed elements that go into electronics or different gadgets usually comes with its personal challenges, together with growing machines that may safely deal with small and intensely fragile components. That’s the place this acoustical manipulator might be instantly helpful. And as a result of there’s no bodily contact made with the fabric being dealt with, acoustic levitation might be notably helpful for dealing with sizzling supplies that pose a danger of injury by bodily contact, and even bio-materials, because the sound waves pose no danger of cross-contamination.

The researchers even demonstrated conditions the place their acoustic levitator can transfer and reposition components behind limitations or inside current buildings: one thing unimaginable for 3D printers and really difficult for bodily manipulators, relying on the place a component wants to finish up.

You can learn extra about LeviPrint in the researchers’ recently-published paper, which was offered on the Siggraph 2022 convention which only in the near past wrapped up in Vancouver, British Columbia.