In the latest of your monthly dose of robot drones coming to a theatre of war hopefully-some-distance-from-you we have news that DARPA have developed a remote military robot with the capability to jump over walls:
Most of the time, the shoebox-sized robot – which is being developed for the US military – uses its four wheels to get around.
But the Precision Urban Hopper can use a piston-actuated “leg” to launch it over obstacles such as walls or fences.
The robot could boost the capabilities of troops and special forces engaged in urban warfare, say researchers.
It occurs to me that in a couple of decades this kind of robot could have developed into a truly terrifying war machine. Imagine thousands of tank-sized versions of these, each containing a really pissed-off synthetic cat brain programmed to zap humans with a tactical high-energy laser.
/DrEvil
[from the BBC, via h+ Magazine][image from h+ Magazine]
I doubt the physics would scale to something tank sized, (besides why go over the wall when you can go through it?) but think of these things carring a couple pounds of explosives and able to jump in through a window. And it probably won’t be long before you see the plastic RC versions of this in toy stores.
Actually, I would be more scared of 10,000 of these running around with poison darts, htan I am of a few hundred big ones. I can kill a Rhino before he gets me, but a mesquito will eventually bite me.