科学家们训练这块塑料“行走”

科学家们训练这块塑料“行走”

Scientists have trained a piece of plastic to move and stick to an object of a given color.

科学家们训练了一块塑料，让它移动并粘在一个特定颜色的物体上。

The study, published in the journal Matter, was inspired by Russian scientist Ivan Pavlov’s famous experiment, in which dogs were trained to anticipate food at the sound of a bell.

在俄罗斯科学家伊万·巴甫洛夫的著名实验中，狗狗被训练成听到铃响时预测食物，这项发表在《物质》杂志上的研究便是受该实验的启发。

It’s the first time an inanimate object has been taught to move in this way without using computer programming, scientists in Finland said.

芬兰的科学家说，这是第一次教一个无生命物体不用计算机编程就可以这样移动。

Professor Olli Ikkala, from Aalto University, said: “At first, the liquid crystal polymer did not react to light at all, but during the process, it learned to move and grab objects under the guidance of light.”

阿尔托大学的奥利·伊卡拉教授说：“起初，液晶聚合物对光根本没有反应，但在这个过程中，它学会了在光的引导下移动和抓取物体。”
Professor Arri Priim?gi, from Tampere University, added: “For material to learn, it must have a memory. When the material is heated, the dye originally spread on the surface of the liquid crystal polymer penetrates into the material, thus forming the memory.

坦佩雷大学的Arri Priim?gi教授补充道：“要学习材料，就必须有记忆。当材料被加热时，最初分布在液晶聚合物表面的染料渗透到材料中，从而形成记忆。”

“Different dyes react to different wavelengths of light, so the initially neutral stimulus (color of light) can be controlled by the dye applied onto it.”

“不同的染料对不同波长的光起反应，所以最初的中性刺激(光的颜色)可以由施加在它上面的染料来控制。”

It’s hoped the research will prove useful in the emerging field of soft robotics.

希望这项研究能在新兴的软机器人领域发挥作用。

Ikkala said: “If you give a typical mechanical robot a strawberry it might crush it.”

Ikkala说：“如果你给一个典型的机械机器人一个草莓，它可能会压碎它。”

“So, we need robots that can grasp things very softly. Traditional robots also often need a power cord or a large, heavy battery.”

“所以，我们需要能够非常轻柔地抓取物体的机器人。传统的机器人也常常需要一根电源线或一块大而重的电池。”

“Soft robotics aims at lightweight, external control, for example by using light.”

“软机器人技术的目标是轻量化的外部控制，例如使用光。”