Salmon sperm bioplastic cup, robots reproduce for first time, biobased fur and more: The Digest’s Top 8 Innovations for the week of December 10th

#2 Robots reproduce for the first time, thanks to Pac-Man

In New England, university scientists have reported the first known robot reproduction, enabled in part by the tiny organisms’ Pac-Man-like shape.

The research team, comprised of members from University of Vermont, Tufts University, and Harvard’s Wyss Institute, earlier this year created programmable organisms, which they dubbed xenobots, using African clawed frog stem cells and artificial intelligence.

For science, but also probably for fun, the team was able to induce certain behaviors, like walking and “working together in a swarm,” by changing the xenobots’ shapes.

One shape in particular—the Pac-Man—allowed the xenobots to “spontaneously self-replicate.”

According to the work, published in PNAS, these xenobots would gather stem cells using their maw, ultimately forming clusters that would grow and form new xenobots.

More on the story, here.