The tails of a seahorse comprises an adjusted square prisms and is surrounded by with bony like plates. With a rare and unique tails structure like that, researchers believe that they can built the next gen volatile robots that will be able to perform complex surgeries in the medical world.
The seahorse is covered with an unusual skeletal structure with a tail in which there is a vertebral column enclosed by square bony plates. Even though it is technically a fish, the seahorse comprises a tail which through the millions of years of evolution have essentially lost the power to support the animal in swimming.
The study on the seahorse was led by Michael M. Porter of Clemson University, who discovered that the square-prism shape facilitates seahorse with a functional advantage. The team designed a 3D-printed model that impersonated the square prism of a seahorse tail and another in cylindrical shape and hit them with a rubber mallet that twisted them and bent them.
The result of the model showed that the square prototype was firmer, stouter and more irrepressible than the circular one when crumpled. Scientists reported that it aids the seahorse with constricting strength in averting any sort of damage when it grasps things. Both the prototypes were able to get bent roughly 90 degrees but the cylindrical version was marginally less restricted.
To talk about the potential invention of new robots, Porter stated that the seahorse tail could instigate innovative types of armor and help construct new search-and-rescue robots, which will be able to meander on the ground just like a snake and might have the power to shrink to fit into tight spaces.
Such robots and appliances might aid laparoscopic surgery where a robotic device could allow enriched control and flexibility as it gets inside a body, moves around organs and bones, and then has the power to achieve a surgical task.
The scientists clarified that the tail plates can effortlessly slide over one another unlike the round ones that could not do without pushing into each other and distorting the overall shape.
Any prototype robot with such applications in the future are hopeful for being used in surgeries, search and rescue mission, and military technology.
