Microscopic 'swimming robots' inspired by sperm cells developed to bring drugs to parts of the body

Researchers have designed miniature robots that are inspired by cells and steered by ultrasound that could one day navigate the human body and help deliver drugs to certain parts of it. These'rocket ships,' as described by scientists at Cornell University, have a design that is inspired by both bacteria and sperm cells. The robots, which could navigate through the human body are controlled remotely and could take advantage of some features of sperm and bacteria cells, including the fact that bacteria can swim 10 times their body length and sperm can go against the flow. 'We can make airplanes that are better than birds nowadays,' said study co-author, Mingming Wu, professor of biological and environmental engineering at Cornell, in a statement. 'But at the smallest scale, there are many situations that nature is doing much better than us.