# Liquid metal solves maze

## TL;DR

This paper demonstrates that a gallium droplet can autonomously solve a physical maze by navigating along electrical current lines, leveraging its physical properties and conductivity, suggesting potential for liquid state computational devices.

## Contribution

Introduces a novel liquid metal-based maze solving method that utilizes electrical conductivity and surface tension, advancing liquid metal applications in computation.

## Key findings

- Gallium droplet successfully solves maze using electrical current guidance.
- The droplet remains stable and navigates corners due to high surface tension and conformability.
- The method offers a long-lasting, non-toxic liquid metal computational approach.

## Abstract

A room temperature liquid metal features a melting point around room temperature. We use liquid metal gallium due to its non-toxicity. A physical maze is a connected set of Euclidean domains separated by impassable walls. We demonstrate that a maze filled with sodium hydroxide solution is solved by a gallium droplet when direct current is applied between start and destination loci. During the maze solving the droplet stays compact due to its large surface tension, navigates along lines of the highest electrical current density due its high electrical conductivity, and goes around corners of the maze's corridors due to its high conformability. The droplet maze solver has a long life-time due to the negligible vapour tension of liquid gallium and its corrosion resistance and its operation enables computational schemes based on liquid state devices.