Micro-robots: The army’s new spies

Meet little robots who are joining the army as special, very tough, mechanical spider spies. The army placed its largest-ever order of the micro-bots with ReconRobotics, Inc. recently.

From Mashable:

A contract worth $13.9 million will supply the U.S. Army with 1,100 Recon Scout XT micro-robot kits. The 1.2 pound robot is equipped with a camera that can do indoor and outdoor surveillance for soldiers in combat.

And these bots can take a beating.

Ernest Langdon, director of military programs for ReconRobotics, said the bots are designed to take 1600Gs of impact. They can be thrown 120 feet and take repeated 30 foot drops onto concrete. And those are just the specs — Langdon said he’s seen the bots survive even more abuse.

Mashable has a video of the bots — check it out here.