In recent years, we have heard a ton about “saving the bees”. What exactly is the huge importance of bees in our ecosystem? Bees are essential for the pollination of many plants or crops that make up our food supply such as fruits, vegetables, nuts, and seeds. They also help maintain biodiversity through the pollination process. Without bees, we’d be in big trouble in regards to our food supply and the diversity in our ecosystem, and we’d be without the production of honey. The “Saving The Bees” phrase came about to bring awareness to the major decline in the bee population in recent years. In 2016, the United States lost 44% of all its honeybee colonies—yes, it’s that bad. These declines are mainly caused by habitat loss, pesticide use, and disease: most caused by human intervention. However, a fairly recent innovation has proven to be useful in terms of the pollination of our crops and plants: robot bees.
Researcher Eijiro Miyako from Japan’s National Institute of Advanced Industrial Science and Technology invented an insect-sized drone that could artificially transfer pollen from one plant to another. Using an ionic, eco-friendly gel and horse bristles to mimic a bee’s fur to carry the pollen from one plant to another, the vision was deemed successful through the use of this gel on live subjects such as ants. However, the focus moved to implementing these features on tiny drones. Now what is the motivation for this?
“Although artificial pollination is already possible, it’s a tedious, time-consuming process. When done by hand, using a brush to apply the pollen, a person can pollinate five to 10 trees a day, depending on the size of the trees. Tackling thousands of trees takes major manpower and a hefty budget,” says Crystal Ponti from NPR.
Not only is Eijiro Miyako developing this idea, but researchers at Harvard’s Wyss Institute for Biologically Inspired Engineering are taking the lead on this new development and not only bees, but other robotic insects. According to researchers at the Wyss Institute, the development of these bees consists of three main components, which are the body, the brain, and the colony.
The functionality of these bees can be broken down into these parts: “Body development consists of constructing robotic insects able to fly on their own with the help of a compact and seamlessly integrated power source; brain development is concerned with “smart” sensors and control electronics that mimic the eyes and antennae of a bee, and can sense and respond dynamically to the environment; the Colony’s focus is about coordinating the behavior of many independent robots so they act as an effective unit,” describes the Wyss Institute.
Although this innovation seems like it’s well in the works, there are some issues that arise with its creation. Because of the size of these bees, which are only a few inches, the power of the batteries used aren’t as efficient as they would like them to be in terms of power-to-mass ratio. Not only this, but because of their size, the robotic bees movement through the air would not be as precise as needed through the use of human controllers. Clearly, “robobees” are a work in progress in terms of development and testing, but from a social and ethical standpoint, there are lots of reasons as to why people stand against it.
According to Simon G. Potts et al., drones will never be sufficient enough to replace the value of real bees in biodiversity: “We highlight that emerging technologies have many beneficial roles to play in society, but in this case there is no justification for needlessly trying to replace a key component of biodiversity which can readily be protected and enhanced.”
Their argument mainly lies on 6 reasons: artificial pollination by robots is far from being able to replace bees to pollinate efficiently, it would not be economically viable, negative environmental effects, potential damage of wider ecosystems, erase the value of biodiversity, and could lead to major food insecurity. Overall, it’s important to note that if we solve problems like these using technological alternatives, it could prove detrimental to our biodiversity and initiate a chain reaction of global disaster. Although it could work, how will this affect the future of our planet?
Hey Angela, I really had no idea we were having a dilemma with our bees, but I do know how vital they are for our ecosystems. I especially remember this from how “The Bee Movie” portrayed it. All of this sounds like a great idea, though. One of the worries I have would be bad weather and harsh winds. I wonder if the “robobees” would be better or worse in these situations compared to the organic bees. I hope we can find a good solution to this issue down the road by either perfecting these current robobees or saving the real ones!
Hey Angela, I didn’t know about the decline in our bee population. Bees are essential to our lifestyles and their environment as a whole so it’s shocking to see that there hasn’t been action taken to preserve their habitats. As tech continues to innovate day by day, the concept of robot bees makes more sense. Even though there are still a few functionality problems with the bees, I believe that they can be improved and soon imitate normal bees. The ramifications of the robot bees may not be efficient but at least we have some type of pollination instead of none. Nonetheless, we as humans must be cognizant of our ecosystem and value natural processes such as pollination in order to safeguard our future.
This was a great post. I did not ever consider robot bees as a solution to this problem. The type of ideas people can come up with is pretty incredible given the time. I think it is a fairly bold statement by Simon however to say that drones will never be as efficient as bees at pollinating. I am sure many people thought the same about computers and humans originally until the calculator put us in our place.
Hi Angela! Great and interesting post. It’s even funnier because I literally just decided to watch The Bee Movie randomly yesterday. I had no idea that artificial pollination was even a thing. I personally could not imagine just sitting there for hours putting pollen on trees. I’m really glad that robot bees were invented; I think it will definitely help the world. Of course, as you stated, there are limitations. However, I feel as these limitations can be combatted with more research and development. Soon, robot bees will literally be everywhere. However, I’m wondering, do you think if we don’t pay much attention, we won’t realize what a normal bee is in comparison to a robot bee? I feel like I wouldn’t notice unless I really looked.
Hey Angela, I thought your post this week was very interesting. I haven’t heard much about the scarcity of bees in our environment, but I they hold a large importance in the production of crops and plants. I don’t think the robot bees could ever replace the role of actual bees but it’s a great start for areas lacks a large population of bees. I wonder if there is a better alternative to robot bees in order to pollinate plants. Very cool blog post! Never thought I would read about robotic bees.
Cool post Angela! It’s crazy to think that we’re losing so many bees and how much they really do for our environment. But I’m glad that researchers are working on a solution with robot bees. It seems like a cool idea, but I can also see why some people are worried about the potential negative effects. Although I do find the idea of getting stung by a robot bee to be pretty funny. I wonder which one would hurt more.
Love this post Angela! Bees are such an important part of our ecosystems and its sad to see that we have to resort to fake bees. This technology seems very crazy to me but if it would speed up the artificial pollination process than it would greatly benefit us as a whole. Hopefully the technology can eventually replicate a bees true impact on the ecosystem but until then its a cool idea.
This is a very cool technology. As you said with the effectiveness of batteries right now it isn’t a feasible possibility for the present, but hopefully, we can help support bee ecosystems and habitats to keep our pollinator friends with us. I can’t believe the big decrease in population in 2016, that is crazy.
Hi Angela! The decline of the US bee population is extremely concerning. I remember first hearing about this problem in high school, and I was confused as to how it could be addressed. My first thought was that we should stop spraying harmful pesticides and try to rebuild their habitats, but robot bees are a much different way to fix this. It is fun to think about “robbers” as a solution, but it fails to solve the bee population crisis.
It’s really exciting to see how technology is being used to address environmental concerns like the decline in bee populations. We’ve seen previous blog posts regarding the oceans so to see this side of environmental concerns is fantastic Angela! While robot bees may help with pollination, they will never be able to fully replace the value of real bees maintaining ecosystems. Like you said towards the end, there are questions about the economic viability of implementing such a technology on a large scale, you have to consider the amount of robot bees needed to cover/replace the value of real bees, the cost of the brain and body (battery, sensors, etc). Overall, it is very cool to see something like this in development
Hey Angela, the integration of robot bees could be game changing and it’s wild to think that if we looked back maybe 15 years ago, we would have never thought of this as a solution to such a drastic environmental issue. I’d like to see how they roll these bees out. Would we just drop them from an airplane of would we just let them go where they want?
Hi Angela! Robotic bees are definitely a game changer! I have heard a lot about the decline of bees so being able to find a solution is extremely exciting. I think this has been one of my favorite uses of technology recently.
Hey Angela! Have you ever watched the TV show “Black Mirror”? I highly recommend it if you have not! There are lots of ideas in that show that I see us talk about and it blows my mind. In the case of this blog post, robotic bees kinda freak me out. It is also quite sad that we are even thinking about making these. I know that if the bee population continues to decrease then this may be a necessity but I would rather come up with ways to help save the bees rather than just replace them. I think technology like this can make humans more content with the idea of animals going extinct as we will have the idea of just “we will replace them” rather than doing anything to save them.
Really creative post. I love it! I can’t decide whether robot bees are completely cool or absolutely terrifying, though. 🙂
Hey Angela! Great post! It’s true that bees play a crucial role in our ecosystem by pollinating many of the plants that make up our food supply. The decline in the bee population is a major concern, and the development of robot bees is an innovative solution to help with pollination. It’s essential that we find ways to protect and enhance our natural ecosystems without jeopardizing their delicate balance.
Hey Angela! This is such an interesting development! The bees definitely need some help because pollination is so important. I do wonder how these robot bees will affect real bees and if it will help or hurt them because I hope this is just an assistance until the bee population problem gets better.