(Nanowerk Spotlight) Of course, most robots can change directions, speeds – some can even change their colors. But what about changing their shapes? Researchers are beginning to create robots that can ...

At only 16 inches wide and 27 inches long, iRobot Corporation’s PackBot Explorer can enter tunnels, sewers and collapsed structures. However, the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency is now ...

'Smarticles' could be key to new locomotion technique. Researchers have taken a new approach to developing robots—using smaller robots known as “smarticles” to unlock the principles of a potentially ...

Korean researchers have developed an advanced soft robot, OCTOID, inspired by the multifunctional abilities of octopuses. Leveraging cholesteric liquid crystal elastomers (CLCEs), OCTOID combines ...

The hydrogel changes shape when exposed to chemical stimulation, allowing researchers to orient the cellulose nanoparticles at will and, therefore, ‘program’ the robot’s shape-changing, an important ...

Coming to a tight spot near you: CLARI, the little, squishable robot that can passively change its shape to squeeze through narrow gaps—with a bit of inspiration from the world of bugs. CLARI, which ...

A person-shaped robot liquifies to escape a cage, then cools back into its original shape in a mold placed in the ground outside the bars. Wang and Pan et al. under CC BY-SA Researchers have created a ...

A shape-shifting robot swarm could make the trip to the Moon with future astronaut missions. The robot, which is called the Mori Modular Robot for Space, or Mori3, is a polygonal shape-shifting robot ...

There are several ways to figure out which robot design is the most efficient for crossing various terrains. The most time-consuming would be to simply build every variation of a robot and test them ...

Daniela Rus, a professor of computer science and engineering at MIT and a principal investigator at its Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence Lab (CSAIL), is working on yet another innovative ...