Jenna Boures
Staff Writer
@jboures

Attention science aficionados: the future is here and it looks like Doctor Octopus from Spiderman.

Festo, a German engineering firm, has developed a robotic elephant trunk with basic motor skills using new technology.

Digital Spy reported that software developers Jochen Steil and Matthias Rolf used a process called “goal babbling” to enable the robot to learn how to grab objects, just like a human child.

Named the “Bionic Handling Assistant,” the robot is made up of pieces from a 3D printer.  It has the ability to learn from its mistakes—each time it fails to pick up an object, its pneumatic tubes adjust to improve its grip and motions.

In the future, the robot could be used for changing light bulbs or picking fruit.

Festo first presented the concept in 2010.  Look how far this elephant trunk robot has come in just four short years:

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