Swimming Living Robots Can Self-Train

Roboticists aim to mimic what natural biological entities have achieved — actions like moving, adapting to the environment, or sensing. Beyond traditional rigid robots, the field of soft robotics has recently emerged using compliant, flexible materials capable of adapting to their environment more efficiently than rigid ones. With this goal in mind, scientists have been working in the field of biohybrid robots or biobots. These generally are composed of muscle tissue, either cardiac or skeletal, and an artificial scaffold that can achieve crawling, grasping, or swimming. Unfortunately, current biobots are unable to emulate the performance of natural entities in terms of mobility and strength.