According to Popular Science, German researchers have designed firefighting robots mimicking beetles. The OLE robotic beetle (short for ‘Offroad Löscheinheit’ — which means ‘off-road extinguishing apparatus’ in German) has been developed at the University of Magdeburg-Stendal. The OLE would be ‘autonomous and guided by GPS, infrared and heat sensors and could be equipped with tanks of water and powdered fire-extinguishing agents.’ According to the developers, such a robot would cost between $125 and $200K. But a small army of 30 OLEs could survey a 7,000 square kilometers area. But read more…

Links: ZDNet, Primidi