Scientists in the US have built the first-ever "living robot" or xenobot, by engineering bits of frog embryo to behave like "living, programmable organisms" and not like a traditional robot or any known species of animal. The research is an advance that may lead to computer-designed "life forms" capable of delivering drugs into the human body, clean up radioactive waste, collect microplastics in the oceans or even scrape out plaque from human arteries. The bots are named after the species of African frogs, Xenopus laevis, whose embryonic cells or stem cells the research team gathered for the project.
