A crawling robotic snake has been developed using Kirigami – an ancient Japanese paper cutting technique. The flat Kirigami surface gets transformed into a 3D textured surface when the robot stretches. Such soft robots could be used in inspection, exploration and in search and rescue missions. They started making by taking a simple, flat sheet. They used tools like laser cutter, they embedded an array of centimetrescale cuts, experimenting with different sizes and shapes. After it was cut once, the researchers had wrapped the sheet around a tube-like elastomer actuator, which expands and contracts with air like balloon. When the actuator expands the Kirigami cuts gets popped-out and the cuts fold flat, propelling the crawler forward.
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