Transforming Robots Will Go to Mars

A lead core, which can put on a range of exoskeletons. This is the scientists’ newest idea as to how we can best explore alien planets.

TECHNOLOGY We know them from films, toys and cartoons: Transformers, robots, which can reconfigure their form and change from driving to sailing or flying. In an experiment at MIT, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, fantasy has now been turned into reality. A team of engineers has developed a small robot, which can change between four functions by means of a self-folding exoskeleton. The design is inspired by origami, the Japanese art of paper folding.

The robot consists of a cube and four sheets of paper-thin plastic, which, by means of heat, can fold into an exoskeleton that gives the cube special characteristics. In their tests, the scientists remotely- controlled the robots using magnets and electricity, but with time, the plan is to develop them so that they can move autonomously.

The scientists hope that their small and multifunctional robot will pave the way for a completely new type of robot, which can specialise to the job at hand. For example, space agencies will not have to send many different robots to Mars in future – one single robot with a bunch of exoskeletons will be enough to build a colony on the planet.