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  • BBC Science Focus Magazine

    Living robots capable of self-replication created in US lab

    Jan 20, 2022 4 minutes
    SAM KRIEGMAN Roboticist

    HOW DID THIS PROJECT START OUT?

    This project started as a collaboration between developmental biologists and roboticists. Our goal was to learn about how animals grow and regenerate by building robots with similar abilities. We made our first robots out of silicone rubber, which could change shape and volume to mimic growth. From there, we simply followed the scientific questions we found to be the most interesting, and our curiosity led us to the idea of building robots out of biological cells. Specifically, cells from the African clawed frog Xenopus laevis. Hence their nickname, xenobots.

    YOU FIRST DESIGNED THE SHAPES OF THE XENOBOTS USING A COMPUTER SIMULATION, DIDN’T YOU?

    That’s correct, I built a simulation

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