Anthrobots: Robots from Cells
What is a robot? When most people hear about robotics and Artificial Intelligence, they probably picture humanoid robots like the ones that Boston Dynamics or Tesla are making. According to the Oxford Dictionary, robot means “a machine resembling a human being and able to replicate certain human movements and functions automatically” or “a machine capable of carrying out a complex series of actions automatically, especially one programmable by a computer” (“Robot, N.2 Meanings, Etymology and More | Oxford English Dictionary,” 2024). While both of these definitions apply to the humanoid robots that large tech companies are making, they can include other types of robots also. For example, some robots do not look remotely like a human except for something that resembles an arm. Some do not even have that. One example of a robot like this is a biological robot. A biological robot is a robot that is based on an animal. Some examples for this are Spot from Boston Dynamics or one of many snake looking robots that are being developed. While not all biological robots fall under the category of soft robot, a robot made from pliable material like elastomers or biological tissue, many do. Both of these materials allow a robot to move around in ways that metal would not. Some biological robots mimic animals such as snakes or eels, while others are actually their own organism. One subset of a biological robot is a living robot, a robot that is made from cells and operates on its own. The two types of living robots that have been made are Xenobots and Anthrobots with the primary difference being the source material for the robots. Xenobots are named for the species of frog they were taken from, Xenopus Laevis, while Anthrobot comes from the Greek root Anthro meaning man.
Xenobots are a type of living robot created from frog skin and heart cells derived from frog embryos (Brown, 2020). Unlike traditional robots made from metal or plastic, these robots are composed of organic material. Scientists from Tufts University, the University of Vermont, and Harvard University observed that Xenobots naturally moved in circles and pushed pellets into piles. To optimize their design for this behavior, researchers used a supercomputer to model hundreds of different configurations. They eventually settled on a Pac-Man-like design. The cells were then assembled into this shape using tiny forceps and an electrode to bond them (Brown, 2020).
Using the pacman shape and natural tendency to make piles, the scientists at UVM were able to get the Xenobots to reproduce in a way that is not seen in nature. Instead of splitting through mitosis or creating gametes, Xenobots push other cells together into a new organism. Before the pacman shape, whenever the Xenobots replicated themselves, after only one to two generations it looked like a ball and did not function very well (Kriegman et al., 2021). Scientists believe that the kinematic self-replication that the Xenobots do, could be proof of abiogenesis. Abiogenesis is the belief that life on earth formed from non-living materials and that it has gotten progressively more complex over time. Beyond being a proof of concept for living robots and kinematic self replication, this type of robot can be used for an incredible array of medical procedures including delivering medicine and targeting cancer and blood clots.
This thinking is what led to the creation of the Anthrobot, a living robot made out of human cells rather than frog ones. Anthrobots can also form themselves in a petri dish, rather than needing humans with tweezers to assemble them. These Anthrobots are made out of human lung and tracheal cells because the cells have cilia along their border. In the human body these cilia are used to clear the throat whereas in the robots they are used for mobility. Like the Xenobots, Anthrobots possess the ability to heal themselves. This ability gives scientists an easy way to study how the human body repairs itself. Additionally, having the ability to quickly make anthrobots out of people would be helpful for creating noninvasive robots to clear arteries or distribute medicine (Silver, 2023).
Adding on to this discovery, further also found that cells can still be made into a Xenobot or Anthrobot despite an organism's recent death. They discovered that the cells could be used for about six weeks before they stopped working. Scientists are not fully sure why this happens, but the leading idea is that cells are very similar to electrical circuits due to the channels and pumps in the cell membrane. Then due to decomposition, after six weeks the channels and pumps do not line up right or are gone completely. Understanding why the cells can still be used, and subsequently why they later cannot be used could be used to engineer robots that deliver medicine and then decompose themselves (Orf, 2024).
While there have been many advancements in the biorobotic field, many more are still being made. As of right now there is not an ethical issue Xenobots and Anthrobots because they lack a nervous system. However, with the jumps that this science is making, it could end up being an ethical dilemma. Currently, despite major advancements, they are still only in labs, however in the coming years they may be used in all the fields of science and could become everyday tools for the medical field.
References
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Retrieved October 31, 2024, from https://www.uvm.edu/news/story/
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Cell Death. Popular Mechanics. Retrieved November 13, 2024, from https://www.popularmechanics.com/science/health/a62244774/biobots-third-state/
Gumuskaya, G., Srivastava, P., Cooper, B. G., Lesser, H., Semegran, B., Garnier,
S., & Levin, M. (2023). Motile living biobots self‐construct from adult
human somatic progenitor seed cells. Advanced Science, 11(4).
https://doi.org/10.1002/advs.202303575
Kriegman, S., Blackiston, D., Levin, M., & Bongard, J. (2021). Kinematic
self-replication in reconfigurable organisms. Proceedings of the National
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Orf, D. (2024, September 20). Scientists Have Uncovered a 3rd State of Life, Which Starts After
Robot, n.2 meanings, etymology and more | Oxford English Dictionary. (2024). Oed.com. https://doi.org/10.1093//OED//4330523394
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human cells. Wyss Institute. https://wyss.harvard.edu/news/
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