Chemical Robots
Chemical Robots, aka ChemBots, aka Blob Bots -- introduced by iRobot and DARPA -- are soft and squishy and easily shape-shifting. They can squeeze themselves through tiny cracks in a wall and emerge on the other side, restored to their original robust configuration, ready to do business.
Third Horizon. It was unveiled at the International Conference on Intelligent Robots and Systems (IROS) in October, 2009, by its maker, iRobot.
According to DARPA DSO:
"During military operations it can be important to gain covert access to denied or hostile space. Unmanned platforms such as mechanical robots are of limited effectiveness if the only available points of entry are small openings.
"The goal of the Chemical Robots (ChemBots) Program is to create a new class of soft, flexible, mesoscale mobile objects that can identify and maneuver through openings smaller than their dimensions and perform various tasks.
"The program seeks to develop a ChemBot that can perform several operations in sequence:
- Travel a distance;
- Traverse an arbitrary-shaped opening much smaller than the largest characteristic dimension of the robot itself;
- Reconstitute its size, shape, and functionality after traversing the opening;
- Travel a distance; and
- Perform a function or task using an embedded payload.
"This program creates a convergence between materials chemistry and robotics through the application of any one of a number of approaches, including gel-solid phase transitions, electro- and magneto-rheological materials, geometric transitions, and reversible chemical and/or particle association and dissociation.
With ChemBots, our warfighters can gain access to denied spaces and perform tasks safely, covertly, and efficiently." http://www.darpa.mil/dso/thrusts/materials/multfunmat/chembots/index.htm
The Department of Defense also identified Chembots in their Unmanned Systems Integrated Roadmap, page 155, 2009.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SbqHERKdlK8
"The new robot, called chembot, changes the shape of its stretchy polymer
skin using a technique called 'jamming skin enabled locomotion'. This
means that different sections of the robot inflate or deflate separately;
controlling this inflation and deflation enables the robot to move."
http://www.technologyreview.com/blog/editors/24235/
See also Robotics: Mobility
A shape shift 'chembot' changes sizes based on the input received.
http://whatthecool.com/scitech/irobots-shape-shifting-chembot
Some view Blob Bots with horror. "[It's] the newest monster to crawl from the hellish landscape of my nightmares," Ron Hogan wrote on the blog PopFi.
"No simple human fortification can withstand the onslaught of a thousand ChemBots, all thirsting to lubricate their synthetic silicon skin with human blood!"
Several others made reference to the 1958 horror film The Blob, which featured an antagonist similar to the ChemBot.
Apart from such hyperventilation, Chembots offer formidable privacy issues if they can indeed manage to slip through almost any crack. Especially as their creators are now working towards putting sensors on its body and giving it the ability to connect to other ChemBots. http://www.iinet.net.au/customers/news/articles/877539.html
http://www.darpa.mil/dso/thrusts/materials/multfunmat/chembots/index.htm
http://www.iinet.net.au/customers/news/articles/877539.html
http://www.engadget.com/2009/10/14/irobot-shape-shifting-chembot-is-back-and-its-bad-video/
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