Shapeshifting minibots printed with 3D ‘ink’

A team of US-based researchers made the new type of 3D printing ink by mixing magnetic iron particles with soft, silicone rubber.

PARIS: Engineers have created a soft, malleable 3D “ink” to print devices that can roll, jump, even grasp objects at the wave of a magnet, they said on June 13. 

The shape-shifting material holds promise for flexible robotics and medicine, said the researchers, mooting tiny devices that can envelop a drug, transport it through the body, and unfold to release it where needed.