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Real-life "Transformers" could soon be used by American soldiers on the battlefield.
The Pentagon's research arm, the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA), is well into the second phase of a project to develop "programmable matter" that could reshape itself to fit any situation, reports SIGNAL magazine.
These mini gadgets are generally known as "multirobot systems" or "swarm robotics". Although the military is interested in them, there are also other (more peaceful) applications for such systems. One application that has been considered is for use in planetary exploration, such as a mission to Mars. The idea proposed is that these things can get into small, tight, or difficult places that larger bots just can't get to and would be in communication with a "mother" base unit on the surface.
The trick with morphing robotics is in how they work both independently and collectively. Here's one example:
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