Skip to main content

Jumping 3D printed spider-bots created to help save lives not enslave them

Spider-botResearchers at the Fraunhofer Institute for Manufacturing Engineering and Automation IPA have developed a prototype spider robot that will provide a cheap, mobile, and effective solution during various hazardous and disaster response missions. The nimble spider-bots are able to access areas that are difficult for humans to reach. They’ll provide a wealth of data and information for emergency response teams. Another plus comes from that fact these bots are remotely controlled therefore access to hazardous or contaminated sites will no longer pose a threat to human lives. Thanks to new 3D printing technology being utilized by the Scientists from the Fraunhofer Institute, the robotic spiders are incredibly cheap and easy to produce.

Inspiration for the spider-robots came after the researchers spent months studying real life arachnids. Because of their excellent mobility, the eight-legged spider-bots are able to access areas simply unreachable by humans and other technological devices. The spider-bot relay information to researchers thanks to its built-in camera, sensor, and measuring equipment. According to Fraunhofer, the robots are even able to jump by pumping fluid into its limbs.

The method of 3D printing, which utilizes a process called selective laser sintering helps produces these rather large spider-bots quickly — reducing cost and allowing for multiple bot construction at the same time. 

While there are no concrete plans to begin mass-producing these eight-legged arachnid bots, Fraunhofer will be showcasing its impressive prototype at the EuroMold 2011 trade fair in Frankfurt, Germany from November 29th to December 2nd.

[Source: Tecca]

Amir Iliaifar
Former Digital Trends Contributor
Associate Automotive Section Editor for Digital Trends, Amir Iliaifar covers the ever increasing cross-section between tech…
This AI cloned my voice using just three minutes of audio
acapela group voice cloning ad

There's a scene in Mission Impossible 3 that you might recall. In it, our hero Ethan Hunt (Tom Cruise) tackles the movie's villain, holds him at gunpoint, and forces him to read a bizarre series of sentences aloud.

"The pleasure of Busby's company is what I most enjoy," he reluctantly reads. "He put a tack on Miss Yancy's chair, and she called him a horrible boy. At the end of the month, he was flinging two kittens across the width of the room ..."

Read more
Digital Trends’ Top Tech of CES 2023 Awards
Best of CES 2023 Awards Our Top Tech from the Show Feature

Let there be no doubt: CES isn’t just alive in 2023; it’s thriving. Take one glance at the taxi gridlock outside the Las Vegas Convention Center and it’s evident that two quiet COVID years didn’t kill the world’s desire for an overcrowded in-person tech extravaganza -- they just built up a ravenous demand.

From VR to AI, eVTOLs and QD-OLED, the acronyms were flying and fresh technologies populated every corner of the show floor, and even the parking lot. So naturally, we poked, prodded, and tried on everything we could. They weren’t all revolutionary. But they didn’t have to be. We’ve watched enough waves of “game-changing” technologies that never quite arrive to know that sometimes it’s the little tweaks that really count.

Read more
Digital Trends’ Tech For Change CES 2023 Awards
Digital Trends CES 2023 Tech For Change Award Winners Feature

CES is more than just a neon-drenched show-and-tell session for the world’s biggest tech manufacturers. More and more, it’s also a place where companies showcase innovations that could truly make the world a better place — and at CES 2023, this type of tech was on full display. We saw everything from accessibility-minded PS5 controllers to pedal-powered smart desks. But of all the amazing innovations on display this year, these three impressed us the most:

Samsung's Relumino Mode
Across the globe, roughly 300 million people suffer from moderate to severe vision loss, and generally speaking, most TVs don’t take that into account. So in an effort to make television more accessible and enjoyable for those millions of people suffering from impaired vision, Samsung is adding a new picture mode to many of its new TVs.
[CES 2023] Relumino Mode: Innovation for every need | Samsung
Relumino Mode, as it’s called, works by adding a bunch of different visual filters to the picture simultaneously. Outlines of people and objects on screen are highlighted, the contrast and brightness of the overall picture are cranked up, and extra sharpness is applied to everything. The resulting video would likely look strange to people with normal vision, but for folks with low vision, it should look clearer and closer to "normal" than it otherwise would.
Excitingly, since Relumino Mode is ultimately just a clever software trick, this technology could theoretically be pushed out via a software update and installed on millions of existing Samsung TVs -- not just new and recently purchased ones.

Read more