Just when you thought you had seen every kind of robot under the sun, researchers at Stanford University and the University of California, Santa Barbara come along and introduce you to something totally new. In this case, it’s a quick-growing soft robot that’s able to extend itself up to 236 feet in length, and navigate through some impressive tight spaces — all by pumping itself up with air.
“We’ve developed a soft robot that extends from its tip in order to navigate its environment,” Professor Elliot Hawkes, lead researcher on the project, told Digital Trends. “It’s pretty different from traditional mobile robots, because the body doesn’t move, but rather grows in length. This has some interesting advantages, [such as the fact] that it creates a structure as it moves, which can later be used to move materials through.”
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