Using Drones To Pollinate Flowers

Bees are one of the most important creatures on the planet, as they play a major role in helping plants grow and reproduce by pollination. And so we must protect them at all costs. But what if bees do become extinct one day? Scientists have been trying to think of alternatives to bees in case that happens. Just recently, some scientists have developed high-tech drones that blow soap bubbles to pollinate flowers.

It’s a “really cool” approach, says Henry Williams, a roboticist at the University of Auckland, who was not involved in the work. But some biologists are skeptical that drones will ever be an effective replacement for bees.

Several groups have devised devices that mimic pollinating honey bees. In 2017, Eijiro Miyako, a materials chemist at the Japan Advanced Institute of Science and Technology, adapted a 4-centimeter-long toy drone to pollinate flowers. He and colleagues glued horsehairs to the underside of the drone and coated the hairs with a gel to make them stickier and more flexible. The idea was that, just as on a bee, the hairs would pick up pollen from one flower and deposit it on another. Steered by remote control, the drone pollinated lilies, but it damaged the flowers with its propellers.

Miyako visualized a way to fix that problem while blowing bubbles in a park with his 3-year-old son. The child had cried when Miyako used up the last of the bubble solution. To soothe his son, Miyako bought a toy bubble gun. Watching the stream of bubbles—and seeing one bump his son’s forehead—Miyako thought it might be a way to gently deliver pollen to flowers.

And so Miyako, along with his colleague, tested his soap bubble hypothesis.

Check out Science Magazine for more details about this bubbly study.

(Image Credit: Eijiro Miyako/ Science Magazine)