At first glance, it looks like a child's science fair project: a flat, plastic cutout with batteries in the middle. Then it shudders to life. A few joints bend. The midsection rises with a startling jolt. Moments later, it scuttles away. This crab-walker - which self-assembles from about $20 worth of parts and walks without human direction - marks an advance in inexpensive and versatile robotics that could ultimately be created for pennies, stacked like a deck of cards and deployed in spaces and applications where no robot has gone before. The robot, created by researchers at Harvard and MIT who published their work in Science in August, is made of paper and 3-D sheets of polystyrene from the children's art toy Shrinky Dinks. Embedded wires heat and shrink the material in certain places, allowing the robot to fold like a piece of origami or unfurl like a flower petal.
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