The ‘Fibrebots’ are a swarm of robots designed to wind fiberglass filament around themselves to create high-strength tubular structures. These structures can be built in parallel and interwoven to rapidly create architectural structures. The robots are mobile, and use sensor feedback to control the length and curvature of each individual tube according to paths determined by a custom, environmentally informed, flocking-based design protocol. This provides designers the ability to control high-level design parameters that govern the shape of the resulting structure without needing to tediously provide commands for each robot by hand.

The 16 robots, including the design system to control them, were developed in-house and deployed to autonomously create a 4.5m-tall structure. The structure remained outside and undamaged through Massachusetts’ winter months, demonstrating the potential of this enabling technology towards future collaborative robotic systems to create once infeasible designs in potentially far-reaching environments.

Harvard roboticist Radhika Nagpal said the machines could join forces with other types of construction robots to build more sophisticated, multi-material structures.

Robotic construction teams could create infrastructure in deserts, underwater or in other hazardous environments — perhaps even in space, she added.

The fibreglass-spinning bots currently are controlled by a computer and can currently build only predesigned structures.

But future versions equipped with cameras, lasers or other sensors could coordinate and respond to obstacles to build site-specific structures on the fly.

That may make them useful for propping up collapsed buildings during search-and-rescue operations.