The Army certainly wants to get ahead of the competition where cool devices are concerned, and this time around, they will continue to use nature as their source of inspiration, creating self-sealing suction cups for robots that are similar in nature to those you find on an octopus. This unique design hails from the U.S. Army Research Laboratory, Edgewood Chemical Biological Center and University of Maryland scientists, where it boasts of a self-sealing component as well as the ability to activate suction cups in reaction to the size and shape of the object that the robot intends to pick up.
I sure hope as heck that it works reliably at all times and circumstances, otherwise carrying some weighty items over the heads of soldiers who are bunked in their respective foxholes would have a bloody and sad ending should the suction cups fail halfway through the task. Good to know that these suction cups are said to carry the potential of working even more efficiently when underwater, similar to an actual octopus, as additional pressure from the water depth will add force, while enhancing the efficacy of the technology.
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