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“[Building] the first prototype was very slow, ”says Hwang Ko. The first step was to determine if the robot would be modeled after a vertebrate – an animal with a spine – or an invertebrate like a squid or an octopus. Since the invertebrate model may offer more freedom of movement, the team originally planned to mimic an octopus, but Hwang Ko says the idea was “too ambitious.”

After working with different designs and material structures, the team finally decided to tackle a simpler form of the chameleon itself. By shaping nanowires into simple patterns of dots, lines, or scaled shapes, they were able to create the complex effect shown in this video.

While previous research on artificial camouflage was often targeted at military use, Hwang Ko hopes that their work will have wider impact, especially in the areas of transportation, beauty, and fashion. Future applications could include cars that adapt their colors to stand out, and even fabric that changes color.

“This chameleon skin, the surface, is essentially a display of sorts,” he says. “It can be used for a soft, stretchable or flexible display.”

However, because the technology is temperature dependent, it does not work as well in extreme cold conditions, which can make it difficult for an artificial chameleon to realize the full spectrum of colors.

Ramses Martinez, an assistant professor at Purdue University who also studies biology-inspired robotics, says translating other biology-inspired systems into new technologies could open up more possibilities, including systems that help find earthquake survivors.