Wirelessly steerable bioelectronic neuromuscular robots adapting neurocardiac junctions

Abstract

Biological motions of native muscle tissues rely on the nervous system to interface movement with the surrounding environment. The neural innervation of muscles, crucial for regulating movement, is the fundamental infrastructure for swiftly responding to changes in body tissue requirements. This study introduces a bioelectronic neuromuscular robot integrated with the motor nervous system through electrical synapses to evoke cardiac muscle activities and steer robotic motion. Serving as an artificial brain and wirelessly regulating selective neural activation to initiate robot fin motion, a wireless frequency multiplexing bioelectronic device is used to control the robot. Frequency multiplexing bioelectronics enables the control of the robot locomotion speed and direction by modulating the flapping of the robot fins through the wireless motor innervation of cardiac muscles. The robots demonstrated an average locomotion speed of ~0.52 ± 0.22 millimeters per second, fin-flapping frequency up to 2.0 hertz, and turning locomotion path curvature of ~0.11 ± 0.04 radians per millimeter. These systems will contribute to the expansion of biohybrid machines into the brain-to-motor frontier for developing autonomous biohybrid systems capable of advanced adaptive motor control and learning.