Meet Octobot, a soft-bodied robot that moves like an octopus

Our future robot overlords never looked so squishy. A team of scientists led out of Harvard University have managed to build an entirely soft robot -- one that's inspired by an octopus. The octobot, described this week in the journal Nature, could pave the way toward more effective soft robots that could be used in search and rescue, exploration and to more safely interact with humans. "The octobot is a minimal system designed to demonstrate our integrated design and fabrication strategy," the study authors wrote, "which may serve as a foundation for a new generation of completely soft, autonomous robots." Traditionally, robots have been seen as stiff, angular entities, made of metal and other rigid materials (think C3PO in Star Wars).