DARPA Planning Liquid Robots

moon_monkey writes "According to New Scientist, Darpa is soliciting proposals for so-called Chemical Robots (ChemBots) that would be soft, flexible and could manoeuvre through openings smaller than their static structural dimensions. They suggest that it could be made from shape-memory materials, electro- or magneto-rheological materials or even folding components."

Have You Seen This Boy?

[igotmybfg]

*Holds up picture of John Connor*

Usage

[Chris whatever]

I would by a door made out of this material and it would slap solicitors whenever they knock at my door.

Re:Have You Seen This Boy?

[croddy]

Wolfy's fine, honey. Where are you?

When someone asks what crawled up your ass.....

[Chineseyes]

Now when someone asks what crawled up your ass they might be very serious.

You're not thinking like a woman

[MarkByers]

> I'm not exactly sure what they want with a robotic slug though. The design request seems pretty weird to me.

It's not meant for men.

Call the Governator

[roman_mir]

The Governator Arnold must be notified immediately, his presence in our world was not in vain. He will still have his fight before he is 120.

NO YOU FOOLS!

[Geekfather]

YOU'VE KILLED US ALL!!!

The BLOB!

[throatmonster]

What, it only takes 40 years for the DoD to pick up on cheesy B-grade sci fi movies?

I always really liked the skit about the "Snit" - scientists supposedly create an organism that is comprised of the perfect form of protein.

Interviewer: "What does it look like?"
Scientist: "Kind of like guacamole, with eyes."

and a bit later on...

Scientist: "The only problem is we haven't figured out how to kill it."
Interviewer: "Have you tried grinding it up?"
Scientist: "Yes, we just get more snits.

and at the end...

Scientist: "And then there's the problem with the guards..."
Interviewer: "What problem?"
Scientist: "Last night, we had 2 150-pound guards. This morning, we had one 300-pound snit."

Was this a Monty Python skit?

Re:Have You Seen This Boy?

[HangingChad]

Yeah, it's all fun and games until your liquid robot reshapes its hand into a poker and someone loses an eye.

But but

[ady1]

But do they spill linux?

Forget Chembots

[Anonymous Coward]

I want Fem-Bots! Groovy, baby...

Re:Gah - not really liquid

[rubycodez]

a mimetic polyalloy

Teen Band...

[Anonymous Coward]

Wasn't there some of teen band named My Chemical Robot?

Re:But but

[The_Wilschon]

I can almost imagine a Beowulf gallon of these!

Re:Have You Seen This Boy?

[llamaxing]

and then it's mitosis! (haha, cell division. I crack myself up!)

Re:Artificial muscle required

[Elemenope]

Even better would be if we went with an amoeba or something similar, where there are no bones at all, merely controlled motive forces. Are there any engineering specialists around to tell me if there's any good way to do something like that?

Yes. Hire an amoeba.

Re:MOD PARENT UP

[Xentor]

I can't...

+1 Funny
-1 Wrong Ocean