A potentially new way to build adaptive spaces out of generic robotic forms. Seemingly simple although no doubt devilishly complicated to develop, graceful in their movements and strangely cute considering their sandy brown color. With half a tongue in cheek, I imagine these little robots being the bricks and mortar of the interactive architecture world.

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Developed at the Cornell Computational Synthesis Lab, here’s their explanation of the principles of the project “Self-replication is a fundamental property of many interesting physical, formal and biological systems, such as crystals, waves, automata, and especially forms of natural and artificial life. Despite its importance to many phenomena, self-replication has not been consistently defined or quantified in a rigorous, universal way, nor has it been demonstrated systematically in physical artificial systems. Our research focuses both on a new information-theoretic understanding of self-replication phenomena, and the design and implementation of scalable physical robotic systems where various forms of artificial self replication can occur. Our goal is twofold: To understand principles of self-replication in nature, and to explore the use of these principles to design more robust, self-sustaining and adaptive machines.”

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