Atiny, jellyfish-like robot can swim like the real deal, carry beads, and burrow into a pile of beads. The robot has a soft body, is untethered, and measures 3 mm in width at its core. It has five swimming modes for which the time it takes for contraction and recovery movements of the appendages, called lappets, can be adjusted.
Z. Ren et al., “Multi-functional soft-bodied jellyfish-like swimming,” Nat Commun, doi:10.1038/s41467-019-10549-7, 2019.
Chia-Yi Hou is an intern at The Scientist. Email her at chou@the-scientist.com.
