It swoops, flaps and dives just like the animals it was designed to mimic. Inspired by the flexibility and agility of bats and their wings, a team of engineers has come up with an autonomous flying robot with the same skills – one that could ultimately be used to survey building sites from the air. Aerial robots have previously taken inspiration from insects and birds, but bats are a tougher challenge for roboticists because of their complicated skeletons and irregular flight patterns. "Bats have a very complex body morphology compared to birds or insects. Their wings are very articulated, with many joints," says team member Alireza Ramezani at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.