Have you ever tried to catch a running cockroach? They’re fast little suckers, and resilient too, which is why scientists at the University of California Berkeley modeled their latest robot after them. DASH or Dynamic Autonomous Sprawled Hexapod is a six legged robot made from cardboard and polymer. It’s the size of your open hand, weighs just 16 grams, can run up to 1.5 m/s, and survives falls of 28 meters without damage! This cockroach bot is really something to behold. Check out the IEEE Spectrum video after the break and watch how DASH survives the fall from the top of a building and keeps running.

As robotic systems become increasingly complex, they are able to mimic real world creatures. There are toys like the hexbugs, and more advanced robots like StickyBot that exhibit animal skills and/or behavior. The reverse is also true, we’ve seen robotics used to help explain developments in evolution. This interplay between the sciences is important stuff. When the advances in one field are applied in another the rate of new discoveries increases. Feedback loops between biology and robots may be one of the means by which we develop the next generation of genetically engineered machines and life-like automatons.
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