Artificial Intelligence (AI) has enable robots to walk, swim, and communicate. But now they are even able to replicate themselves. New research shows that living robots can biologically replicate themselves in a unique way.
The discovery was made by the scientists, who came up with the first living robots call Xenobots — from frog cells in 2020.
These tiny computer-design robots can swim to find and gather new single cells around them.
Then, these parent Xenobots assemble the baby robots inside their mouths.
The new robots soon grow up to look and move like their parent robots.
The replicating process continues over generations of Xenobots.
The results of the new research were publish on 29th November, 2021, in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.
According to the University of Vermont, the embryonic cells use in Xenobots would develop into the skin in the Xenopus laevis frog.
Michael Levin, a professor of biology and director of the Allen Discovery Center at Tufts University and co-leader of the new research Said :
Douglas Blackiston, Co-author and senior scientist at Tufts University, Said,
Scientists had the full, unalter frog genome but they had no idea that these could work together to make self-replicating copies of themselves.
Sam Kriegman, the lead author on the new study, Said :
Xenobots are spherical robots made of about 3,000 frog cells.
For these robots to replicate in a self-sustaining manner, they had to be built in shapes that were most efficient.
An artificial intelligence program working on the Deep Green supercomputer cluster at UVM’s Vermont Advanced Computing Core found a way to facilitate motion-base “kinematic” replication.
That’s when the robots were provided with a PacMan-like mouth.
Scientists believe that this new discovery about self-replicating robots will further our understanding of regenerative medicine.
It’ll also help speed up solutions based on AI.
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