(Describer) Streams of light collide to create a globe filled with water. Title: Science Nation. A blue-green caterpillar curves over a fingertip.
(male narrator)
Sometimes it pays
to be spineless.
Take the caterpillar--
it can squirm and crawl in ways
that would make a
contortionist green with envy.
(male)
This little guy can
grip, hold, and move.
We try to make
devices that can do this.
(narrator)
He's talking about a robotic
tobacco hornworm caterpillar.
Already,
Biologist Barry Trimmer
and his team
at Tufts University
have molded plastic models
to simulate
the caterpillar's movements.
With support from the
National Science Foundation,
these guys could be the nucleus
of a new field of robotics.
(Trimmer)
What we call
soft material robotics.
This doesn't really exist
as a discipline currently,
but we're rapidly
moving towards that.
(narrator)
Imagine small,
squishy robots
that could be dropped
into tall trees
to survey
the forest canopy,
or flown into space
to monitor equipment
onboard the space station.
(Trimmer)
It can burrow,
it can climb,
it can navigate
through complex terrain.
(narrator)
Caterpillars don't
have big brains.
Trimmer says these robots
won't either.
(Trimmer)
Instead, you have a body
that can perform
most tasks itself.
We're trying to understand
how the nervous system
and the body work together
to create
those complex movements.
And that could be really
interesting,
because if you don't have
a rigid skeleton or bones,
you can move in ways
that stiff animals can't.
(narrator)
To make a robot
patterned on a caterpillar,
Trimmer's team studies
every aspect,
down to the DNA.
(Trimmer)
This is a newly-hatched larva.
(Describer) ...much smaller than a thumbnail.
We've worked with them
for 20 years,
and I still find
the transformation
from a caterpillar
to the moth to be incredible.
(Describer) The moth it becomes is larger and brown.
It's all in one genome.
It's like reprogramming
a battleship,
taking its blueprint
and building a 747 jet.
(narrator)
Trimmer hopes
that within a decade
a small squishy robot
will be safe enough
to swallow, if you dare,
to help diagnose diseases
or deliver medications.
Amazing how the worm
might turn.
(Describer) The globe turns.
For Science Nation,
I'm Miles O' Brien.
