After the termites inspired crew of tiny autonomous bots, insect-inspired Micro-Robots and Gimball, biomimicry has a new entrant called the Tabbot. It is a tiny bot inspired from Morocco based spiders famous for doing cartwheels effortlessly.
Interestingly, these spiders are capable of doing cartwheels up and down the sand dunes. Ingo Rechenberg, a professor at the Technical University of Berlin has been credited for this discovery. In order to preserve and utilize the resourcefulness of this unique mode of locomotion, the researcher has already fabricated a small bot that works on the same principle, that is, performs cartwheels.
Rechenberg envision that the bot could be employed as an exploring option under the deep ocean belts and on Mars. Along with it, agriculture too has been kept in mind as an alternative investigating option for the tiny machine.
Tumbling and rolling capability of the bot would increase its chances of safely maneuvering across rough terrain like that of Mars and even wet & moist surfaces. Coming in direct contact with the surface below, these bots would be in a better position for weight distribution than with legs or added appendages.
Source: National Geographic
