{"status":"ok","message-type":"work","message-version":"1.0.0","message":{"indexed":{"date-parts":[[2026,3,23]],"date-time":"2026-03-23T15:56:51Z","timestamp":1774281411733,"version":"3.50.1"},"reference-count":26,"publisher":"American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS)","issue":"96","content-domain":{"domain":["www.science.org"],"crossmark-restriction":true},"short-container-title":["Sci. Robot."],"published-print":{"date-parts":[[2024,11,27]]},"abstract":"<jats:p>Increasingly functional microscopic machines are poised to have massive technical influence in areas including targeted drug delivery, precise surgical interventions, and environmental remediation. Such functionalities would increase markedly if collections of these microscopic machines were able to coordinate their function to achieve cooperative emergent behaviors. Implementing such coordination, however, requires a scalable strategy for synchronization\u2014a key stumbling block for achieving collective behaviors of multiple autonomous microscopic units. Here, we show that pulse-coupled complementary metal-oxide semiconductor oscillators offer a tangible solution for such scalable synchronization. Specifically, we designed low-power oscillating modules with attached mechanical elements that exchange electronic pulses to advance their neighbor\u2019s phase until the entire system is synchronized with the fastest oscillator or \u201cleader.\u201d We showed that this strategy is amenable to different oscillator connection topologies. The cooperative behaviors were robust to disturbances that scrambled the synchronization. In addition, when connections between oscillators were severed, the resulting subgroups synchronized on their own. This advance opens the door to functionalities in microscopic robot swarms that were once considered out of reach, ranging from autonomously induced fluidic transport to drive chemical reactions to cooperative building of physical structures at the microscale.<\/jats:p>","DOI":"10.1126\/scirobotics.adn8067","type":"journal-article","created":{"date-parts":[[2024,11,27]],"date-time":"2024-11-27T19:00:25Z","timestamp":1732734025000},"update-policy":"https:\/\/doi.org\/10.34133\/aaas_crossmark","source":"Crossref","is-referenced-by-count":2,"title":["Coordinated behavior of autonomous microscopic machines through local electronic pulse coupling"],"prefix":"10.1126","volume":"9","author":[{"ORCID":"https:\/\/orcid.org\/0000-0002-5512-0603","authenticated-orcid":true,"given":"Milad","family":"Taghavi","sequence":"first","affiliation":[{"name":"Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering, Cornell University, Ithaca, NY, USA."}],"role":[{"role":"author","vocabulary":"crossref"}]},{"ORCID":"https:\/\/orcid.org\/0000-0003-2824-7518","authenticated-orcid":true,"given":"Wei","family":"Wang","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[{"name":"Laboratory of Atomic and Solid State Physics, Cornell University, Ithaca, NY, USA."},{"name":"Sibley School of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering, Cornell University, Ithaca, NY, USA."},{"name":"Kavli Institute at Cornell for Nanoscale Science, Cornell University, Ithaca, NY, USA."}],"role":[{"role":"author","vocabulary":"crossref"}]},{"ORCID":"https:\/\/orcid.org\/0000-0002-0250-3483","authenticated-orcid":true,"given":"Kyubum","family":"Shim","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[{"name":"Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering, Cornell University, Ithaca, NY, USA."}],"role":[{"role":"author","vocabulary":"crossref"}]},{"ORCID":"https:\/\/orcid.org\/0009-0000-6419-0331","authenticated-orcid":true,"given":"Jinsong","family":"Zhang","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[{"name":"Laboratory of Atomic and Solid State Physics, Cornell University, Ithaca, NY, USA."}],"role":[{"role":"author","vocabulary":"crossref"}]},{"ORCID":"https:\/\/orcid.org\/0000-0001-9218-043X","authenticated-orcid":true,"given":"Itai","family":"Cohen","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[{"name":"Laboratory of Atomic and Solid State Physics, Cornell University, Ithaca, NY, USA."},{"name":"Kavli Institute at Cornell for Nanoscale Science, Cornell University, Ithaca, NY, USA."},{"name":"Department of Physics, Cornell University, Ithaca, NY, USA."},{"name":"Design Technology, Cornell University, Ithaca, NY, USA."}],"role":[{"role":"author","vocabulary":"crossref"}]},{"ORCID":"https:\/\/orcid.org\/0000-0001-9199-2292","authenticated-orcid":true,"given":"Alyssa","family":"Apsel","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[{"name":"Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering, Cornell University, Ithaca, NY, USA."}],"role":[{"role":"author","vocabulary":"crossref"}]}],"member":"221","reference":[{"key":"e_1_3_2_2_2","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","DOI":"10.1039\/C8EN00299A"},{"key":"e_1_3_2_3_2","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","DOI":"10.1039\/C9TA06290D"},{"key":"e_1_3_2_4_2","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","DOI":"10.1146\/annurev-bioeng-010510-103409"},{"key":"e_1_3_2_5_2","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","DOI":"10.1038\/s41578-018-0016-9"},{"key":"e_1_3_2_6_2","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","DOI":"10.1038\/4581121a"},{"key":"e_1_3_2_7_2","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","DOI":"10.1073\/pnas.2213698120"},{"key":"e_1_3_2_8_2","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","DOI":"10.1126\/science.ade4985"},{"key":"e_1_3_2_9_2","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","DOI":"10.1109\/JMEMS.2005.863697"},{"key":"e_1_3_2_10_2","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","DOI":"10.1038\/nature25443"},{"key":"e_1_3_2_11_2","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","DOI":"10.1103\/PhysRevLett.74.4189"},{"key":"e_1_3_2_12_2","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","DOI":"10.1037\/0735-7036.122.3.289"},{"key":"e_1_3_2_13_2","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","DOI":"10.1137\/0150098"},{"key":"e_1_3_2_14_2","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","DOI":"10.1038\/scientificamerican1293-102"},{"key":"e_1_3_2_15_2","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","DOI":"10.1126\/scirobotics.abe6663"},{"key":"e_1_3_2_16_2","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","DOI":"10.1038\/s41586-020-2626-9"},{"key":"e_1_3_2_17_2","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","DOI":"10.1126\/scirobotics.abq2296"},{"key":"e_1_3_2_18_2","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","DOI":"10.1038\/s41586-022-04645-w"},{"key":"e_1_3_2_19_2","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","DOI":"10.1109\/JSEN.2010.2051326"},{"key":"e_1_3_2_20_2","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","DOI":"10.1109\/JSSC.2018.2886336"},{"key":"e_1_3_2_21_2","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","unstructured":"D. Bol R. Ambroise D. Flandre J.-D. Legat Building ultra-low-power low-frequency digital circuits with high-speed devices in 2007 14th IEEE International Conference on Electronics Circuits and Systems (IEEE 2007) pp. 1404\u20131407.","DOI":"10.1109\/ICECS.2007.4511262"},{"key":"e_1_3_2_22_2","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","DOI":"10.1016\/S0167-2789(99)00013-5"},{"key":"e_1_3_2_23_2","unstructured":"M. Taghavi K. Shim W. Wang Delay locked synchrony in populations of pulse coupled oscillators (2023); https:\/\/zenodo.org\/records\/10392741."},{"key":"e_1_3_2_24_2","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","unstructured":"A. Apsel X. Wang R. Dokania Design of Ultra-Low Power Impulse Radios vol. 124 of Analog Circuits and Signal Processing (Springer Science & Business Media 2014).","DOI":"10.1007\/978-1-4614-1845-0"},{"key":"e_1_3_2_25_2","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","DOI":"10.1126\/science.1099745"},{"key":"e_1_3_2_26_2","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","DOI":"10.1109\/JPROC.2006.887293"},{"key":"e_1_3_2_27_2","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","DOI":"10.1038\/35065725"}],"container-title":["Science Robotics"],"original-title":[],"language":"en","link":[{"URL":"https:\/\/www.science.org\/doi\/pdf\/10.1126\/scirobotics.adn8067","content-type":"unspecified","content-version":"vor","intended-application":"similarity-checking"}],"deposited":{"date-parts":[[2024,11,27]],"date-time":"2024-11-27T19:00:40Z","timestamp":1732734040000},"score":1,"resource":{"primary":{"URL":"https:\/\/www.science.org\/doi\/10.1126\/scirobotics.adn8067"}},"subtitle":[],"short-title":[],"issued":{"date-parts":[[2024,11,27]]},"references-count":26,"journal-issue":{"issue":"96","published-print":{"date-parts":[[2024,11,27]]}},"alternative-id":["10.1126\/scirobotics.adn8067"],"URL":"https:\/\/doi.org\/10.1126\/scirobotics.adn8067","relation":{},"ISSN":["2470-9476"],"issn-type":[{"value":"2470-9476","type":"electronic"}],"subject":[],"published":{"date-parts":[[2024,11,27]]},"assertion":[{"value":"2023-12-30","order":0,"name":"received","label":"Received","group":{"name":"publication_history","label":"Publication History"}},{"value":"2024-10-31","order":2,"name":"accepted","label":"Accepted","group":{"name":"publication_history","label":"Publication History"}},{"value":"2024-11-27","order":3,"name":"published","label":"Published","group":{"name":"publication_history","label":"Publication History"}}],"article-number":"eadn8067"}}