The fastest-ever swimming soft robot has been inspired by manta rays. A team of American researchers beat its own speed record by drawing inspiration from the iconic sea creatures to improve their ...

Quadruped "robot dogs" may move quite a bit like their canine counterparts on land, but they're not nearly as good at swimming (although some can walk underwater). Such is not the case with a new mini ...

Manta rays are elegantly shaped. They swim by flapping their fins like enormous wings, and their gills filter for plankton with the utmost precision. These creatures have now inspired human ...

Robots have just shrunk to the size of microorganisms. Researchers at the University of Pennsylvania have unveiled what they describe as the world’s smallest fully programmable, autonomous robots, ...

(Nanowerk Spotlight) Building robots that can effortlessly mimic the movements of insects on water has been a persistent challenge in robotics. The ability to move autonomously and efficiently in ...

Swimming robots play a crucial role in mapping pollution, studying aquatic ecosystems, and monitoring water quality in sensitive areas such as coral reefs or lake shores. However, many devices rely on ...

If a robot is being used to gather data in sensitive aquatic environments, it shouldn't have a whirring propeller that could harm wildlife or get caught in weeds. A new bot addresses that issue by ...

For decades, microscopic robots lived mostly in our imagination. Movies like "Fantastic Voyage" convinced us that tiny machines would one day cruise through the human body, fixing problems from the ...