According to a recent press release, DARPA has agreed to continue financing a research program for creating a small flapping-wing flying robot. AeroVironment are the happy recipients of 2.1 million dollars to continue NAV's development after achieving several breakthroughs during the now completed phase I of the project; phase I started in 2007 and lasted for 2 years while phase II is expected to continue until the summer of 2010. Specifically and as you can see from the below video, AeroVironment engineers have successfully built a small flapping-wing robot capable of hovering and flying in all directions under remote control.



The company plans to develop a robot that weighs no more than 10 grams and can be controlled from up to 1 mile away with a top speed of 10 meters per second. Obviously, there are numerous military applications for such robots including surveillance, reconnaissance, and even delivery of deadly payload with high precision.

For another nice high speed video of a flapping wing micro-robot, check out our previous post on the Butterfly Ornithopter.