Fly on the Wall

Did you ever want to be a tiny fly on the wall and listen into conversations? Well, that idea is becoming closer to reality. A 14-inch (36 cm) ultralight prototype has been developed by researchers at the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology in Lausanne.
It was designed after a fly. The design of this super light flyer uses the navigational skills of the fly by incorporating two tiny low-res cameras over each wing representing the large eyes that allow them to see the entire field of view. Flies also have motion sensitive neurons which indicate when something moves across their sight line.

Researchers have found that creating this prototype comes with it’s difficulties.”Indoor environments are really tough,” said Erik Steltz, a PhD candidate in electrical engineering at the University of California, Berkeley. “There are so many things to bang off of I believe this is the best approach out there to do indoor guidance for aircraft.” Essentially, the flyer needs to be able to recognize outside objects and process that internally to know to change direction.

Right now the development team is making steps towards minimizing the size of the flyer, so one day it could be used.

Did you ever want to be a tiny fly on the wall and listen into conversations? Well, that idea is becoming closer to reality. A 14-inch (36 cm) ultralight prototype has been developed by researchers at the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology in Lausanne.
It was designed after a fly. The design of this super light flyer uses the navigational skills of the fly by incorporating two tiny low-res cameras over each wing representing the large eyes that allow them to see the entire field of view. Flies also have motion sensitive neurons which indicate when something moves across their sight line.

Researchers have found that creating this prototype comes with it’s difficulties.”Indoor environments are really tough,” said Erik Steltz, a PhD candidate in electrical engineering at the University of California, Berkeley. “There are so many things to bang off of I believe this is the best approach out there to do indoor guidance for aircraft.” Essentially, the flyer needs to be able to recognize outside objects and process that internally to know to change direction.

Right now the development team is making steps towards minimizing the size of the flyer, so one day it could be used.