Microfluidic Origami for Reconfigurable Pneumatic/Hydraulic (MORPH)
Looking to create a robot smaller than a centimeter that might someday perform precision surgery or help destroy tumors, researchers from Harvard University’s Wyss Institute and School of Engineering and Applied Sciences (SEAS), and Boston University looked to nature for inspiration, and developed a novel microfabrication technique to construct it. Their tiny robot looks like a rubbery, transparent spider — and in fact, the team modeled the form after Australia’s famously colorful and captivating peacock spider.