Soft materials for surgical robotics, that’s the goal of a group in Groningen. They have recently made a surprising step in the right direction, as reported in Science.

To use robots in surgery, you have to make them small. Up to a scale of a few millimetres, traditional mechanical and electronic components are a good choice. But if you want to go even smaller, the rigid components become an obstacle. ‘An alternative that comes from the biomedical field is found in soft materials’, says Michael Lerch, assistant professor of Autonomous Soft Materials at the University of Groningen. ‘Think of a material like contact lenses: they are biocompatible, do not damage tissue and are easy to manufacture. But one big disadvantage is that programming their movements is bloody difficult.’