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Apparently, robots can exist without electronics!!

But like how?

So I came across an octopus inspired gripper robot that can not just stick to things and move them around but also figure out what exactly it’s touching - like is it air or water (see my video embedded with this post). This robot can also feel precisely how rough a surface is, all the way from 400 to 1000 grit. But what amused me most was that it can do all this without any central computer or electronics!

I think that’s incredible because such kind of sophisticated sensing and control in soft robots is typically possible only when you use complex embedded electronics and some kind of central processing system.

So how did the scientists at University of Bristol - who recently developed this octopus inspired suction robot, manage to make the robot figure out what it is touching, without using electronics? By using something called…

Suction Triggered Switches (STSs)

An STS is a purely mechanical system where a suction cup (see my video), just uses air-pressure difference to assess what surface it’s dealing with - a lot like how octopuses assess objects they grip.

And the main advantage of creating a robot like this (that can assess the surface that its lifting, without using electronics) is that it becomes a lot more cost-effective to make them. For example the main component used in this robot is just a 3-volt diaphragm pump - that you can easily find on Amazon for like 200 to 300 rupees. Super cool!

Where could robots like these be used? Well, anywhere from applications like picking delicate fruits to handling any kind of fragile factory goods, to even anchoring all kinds of delicate medical tools inside the human body. Advancement in technology, especially inspired by nature, always fascinates me! Hope you discovered something new! See you guys soon!

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