Spiders just got a whole lot scarier. BAE Systems is creating an army of robotic spiders for the US Army for use in warfare. These spiders will help prevent the deaths of soldiers, on the US side at least. The spiders will at first just be scouts to find and lead soldiers to key points, but eventually the US Army wants a robotic army that is “flying and slithering”. The miniature robots and the technology behind them are funded by a $38 million agreement between BAE Systems and the US Army, with both groups hoping that the robotic spiders will be in wars zones by the end of the year. As if spiders weren’t already scary enough…
The project is known as “The Micro Autonomous Systems and Technology (MAST) Collaborative Technology Alliance”. Here’s what Dr. Joseph Mait of the US Army Research Lab has to say about the project:
“Robotic platforms extend the warfighter’s senses and reach, providing operational capabilities that would otherwise be costly, impossible, or deadly to achieve.
The idea is to get a number of these working together – some tiny, some maybe up to a foot in length, and all going into a building together carrying out different tasks. Eventually we hope to have animals flying and slithering.
The five-year program has just started but we could have them with soldiers within six months, and then continue to develop the concept as the project goes along.”
BAE and the US Army hopes that these spiders save soldiers lives and become a soldier’s best friend. They’ll be able to scout ahead and do surveillance without looking like an obvious robot. This of course raises issues of what non-war applications these spiders have, and if they’ll be used to monitor civilians. Robotic spiders will just the beginning, as the Us Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency is working on creating stealth surveillance robots that can fly and appear to be normal houseflies.
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