Tiny robot leaps around carrying its own battery, electronics

Robots have traditionally been roughly humanoid in form, which has some obvious advantages, in that the robots are better able to integrate into a human-designed environment. But there are lots of environments that aren't human designed, and researchers have been experimenting with robotic forms that look more like insects or fish. Now, a team of Swiss researchers has produced a robot that looks like nothing more than a walking circuit board. Despite its small size, though, the robot is able to move by hopping, leaping, or walking, and it can even work in a group to coordinate activities. The team calls its creation Tribot, for reasons that are obvious from its photo above. Tribot looks like a tiny circuit board because that's what it largely is, but there are some significant additions to the circuitry.