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FlowerBot Robotic Flower Follows And Grabs
FlowerBot is a very nicely implemented robotic flower developed for Carnegie Mellon University's TeRK project. FLowerBot can track objects moving nearby; it can even grab or bite down on anything that comes close enough.
Take a look at this brief FlowerBot video.
(FlowerBot video)
I can't recall an exact match to FlowerBot in sf. However, in his 1964 novel The Killing Machine, Jack Vance refers to a flexible robotic stem used in religious festivals; a person wearing flower petal robes performs at the tip.
I learned that the stems are built up of several dozen smaller tubes, each containing a magnetic slurry: iron powder in a viscous liquid. Reacting to fields from internal windings, these tubes selectively contract with great force. By proper circuitry any contortion of the tubes is posible.
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