Radioactive Uranium Preconcentration via Self-Propelled Autonomous Microrobots

Sounds like the fictional "Japanese Miracle" from Ghost in the Shell, which leads me to wonder how long this idea's been around:

https://ghostintheshell.fandom.com/wiki/Japanese_Miracle

> the researchers designed ZIF-8 rods with diameters about 1/15 that of a human hair

Always amazes me how we're able to create things this small/thin.

> In simulated radioactive wastewater, the microrobots removed 96% of the uranium in an hour

That's a very respectable number, I'm curious how they simulated waste water and what the differences would be with real waste water.

> The team collected the uranium-loaded rods with a magnet and stripped off the uranium, allowing the tiny robots to be recycled.

And they're reusable? Bravo!

> The team collected the uranium-loaded rods with a magnet and stripped off the uranium, allowing the tiny robots to be recycled.

So it appears as if these MOFs capture the uranium and then can be collected.

From the title I expected the micro robots to actually get rid of the material. We still need a way to process the collected uranium and find a way to extract the MOFs from groundwater in case of leakage.

Their "motor" is just a bit of platinum, which makes bubbles in hydrogen peroxide: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A6nGjRB1_s4

I wonder how much H₂O₂ is required per liter of H₂O?

So what do they then do with the uranium? Storage is still a problem, right?

This site is a click farm, please submit the source article instead.

https://pubs.acs.org/doi/10.1021/acsnano.9b04960#

Edit: this account is a bot that just submits from this site: https://news.ycombinator.com/submitted?id=techben

Incredible