The design of microrobots that deliver drugs in the form of particles can increase biosafety and reduce side effects caused by drugs. Our laboratory is the first to implement a microrobot with the concept of delivering drugs in the form of particles by external stimuli and recovering magnetic nanoparticles(MNPs) that can cause side effects in the body. Since the microrobot contains magnetic MNPs, it is possible to accurately move to the lesion using a magnetic field, and it has a process of retrieving the remaining MNPs with a magnetic field after delivering drug particles using an external stimulus.

The helical type microrobot is a natural mimic microrobot optimized for swimming, and a lot of research is being done on it. We are designing a system that separates MNPs by applying an external stimulus to a drug-loaded helical microrobot and then retrieves them using a magnetic field. The microrobot can be driven by a magnetic field, so it can move to the lesion precisely, and it aims to minimize the side effects in the body caused by MNPs by applying an external stimulus from the lesion to retrieve the MNPs.

The micro/milli robot applied with soft robotics that undergoes mechanical deformation in response to external stimuli can be applied to various biomedical fields. Our laboratory is conducting research on drug delivery microrobots and untethered grippers for cargo delivery using external-stimulus responsive hydrogels.