When photons interact with matter, forces and torques occur due to the transfer of linear and angular momentum, respectively. The resulting accelerations are small for macroscopic objects but become substantial for microscopic objects with small masses and moments of inertia, rendering photon recoil very attractive to propel micro- and nano-objects. However, until now, using light to control object motion in two or three dimensions in all three or six degrees of freedom has remained an unsolved challenge. Here we demonstrate light-driven microdrones (size roughly 2 μm and mass roughly 2 pg) in an aqueous environment that can be manoeuvred in two dimensions in all three independent degrees of freedom (two translational and one rotational) using two overlapping unfocused light fields of 830 and 980 nm wavelength. To actuate the microdrones independent of their orientation, we use up to four individually addressable chiral plasmonic nanoantennas acting as nanomotors that resonantly scatter the circular polarization components of the driving light into well-defined directions. The microdrones are manoeuvred by only adjusting the optical power for each motor (the power of each circular polarization component of each wavelength). The actuation concept is therefore similar to that of macroscopic multirotor drones. As a result, we demonstrate manual steering of the microdrones along complex paths. Since all degrees of freedom can be addressed independently and directly, feedback control loops may be used to counteract Brownian motion. We posit that the microdrones can find applications in transport and release of cargos, nanomanipulation, and local probing and sensing of nano and mesoscale objects.

当光子与物质相互作用时，力和扭矩分别由于线性和角动量的传递而发生。由此产生的加速度对于宏观物体来说很小，但对于质量和惯性矩小的微观物体来说却变得很大，这使得光子反冲对于推动微米和纳米物体非常有吸引力。然而，直到现在，使用光来控制所有三个或六个自由度的二维或三个维度的物体运动仍然是一个未解决的挑战。在这里，我们展示了水环境中的光驱动微型无人机（尺寸约为 2 μm，质量约为 2 pg），可以使用两个重叠的非聚焦光场在所有三个独立的自由度（两个平移和一个旋转）中进行二维操作830 和 980 nm 波长。为了独立于它们的方向来驱动微型无人机，我们使用多达四个可单独寻址的手性等离子体纳米天线充当纳米马达，将驱动光的圆偏振分量共振散射到明确定义的方向。只需调整每个电机的光功率（每个波长的每个圆偏振分量的功率）即可操纵微型无人机。因此，驱动概念类似于宏观多旋翼无人机。因此，我们展示了微型无人机沿复杂路径的手动转向。由于所有自由度都可以独立和直接地解决，因此可以使用反馈控制回路来抵消布朗运动。我们假设微型无人机可以在货物运输和释放、纳米操作、