Robot-ants that can jump, communicate with each other and work together

Individually, ants have only so much strength and intelligence, but as a colony they can use complex strategies to complete sophisticated tasks and evade larger predators. At EPFL, robotics researchers in Professor Jamie Paik's Laboratory have reproduced this phenomenon, developing tiny robots that display minimal physical intelligence on an individual level but that are able to communicate and act collectively. Despite being simple in design and weighing only 10 grams, each robot has multiple locomotion modes to navigate any type of surface. Collectively, they can quickly detect and overcome obstacles and move objects much larger and heavier than themselves. The related research has been published in Nature. These three-legged, T-shaped origami robots are called Tribots.