Tweezers of sound can pick objects up without physical contact

eurekalert.org

48 points·geox··13 comments

Lots of cool stuff in this field. They are "ultrasonic tweezers" and ultrasonic should be in the title (of og article) to give more information and lead people in the right direction.

https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S03015...

https://hackaday.com/2021/03/19/surfs-up-a-styrofoam-ball-ri...

Also check out: Ultraleap create interact-able tactile interfaces in midair using ultrasound and hand tracking https://www.ultraleap.com

Iain M Banks' culture books describe the use of effectors to manipulate objects at the quantum level. Amazing if we could develop equiv tech.

"successful manipulation is possible for millimeter-sized particles."

I think this is a form of acoustophoresis, the manipulation of particles using sound. The main applications that I know of are within biology, for (single) cell separation and so on. But maybe there are applications in a more broader chemical setting?

Brings us a step closer to Dr. Who's sonic screwdriver.

This is neat, would be cool if you could hear the audio it makes while lifting

You probably wouldn't want to hear the sound of carrying a vehicle or something of that size (assuming the tech can scale of course)!!

Imagine a very loud sound.

Is air not touching the thing it's picking up?

Because if it is, there's physical contact.

I was thinking that too. This wouldn't work in a vacuum.

Well, no, but that comes along with the idea of "sound," so...

I remember reading a book about ancient civilization using horns to make sounds to lift heavy building blocks which I thought was ridiculous but they were onto something

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