Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein is the go-to classic story that describes the troubles that can arise with reanimating dead things. But here we are, 204 years later and we still haven’t learned our lesson.
Researchers at Texas’ George R. Brown School of Engineering at Rice University have discovered a way to reanimate the corpse of a wolf spider to act as a claw machine.
It can lift more than 130% of its own weight. These “necrobots,” as the scientists call them, are created quite simply.
The team says that this type of research could help improve repetitive tasks like small-scale sorting or the assembly of microelectronics.
And as an added bonus, the spider corpses would biodegrade, which would eliminate a “big waste stream, which can be a problem with more traditional components.”