---
title: "Watch a Leech-Like Robot Crawl Its Way up a Wall"
description: "Researchers from Japan and the U.K. have created a leech-like robot that's soft, flexible, and able to move freely on a wall."
date: "2019-05-14"
modified: "2019-05-14"
authors:
  - name: "Kristin Houser"
    link: "https://futurism.com/authors/kristin"
url: "https://futurism.com/the-byte/watch-leech-like-robot-crawl-wall"
categories:
  - "Robotics"
  - "Robots and Machines"
tags:
  - "bio-inspired robot"
  - "leech"
  - "the digest"
---

# Watch a Leech-Like Robot Crawl Its Way up a Wall

![Researchers from Japan and the U.K. have created a leech-like robot that's soft, flexible, and able to move freely on a wall.](<https://futurism.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/05/watch-leech-like-robot-crawl-wall.png>)
*\<em\>Image: Toyohashi University of Technology\</em\>*

## Bugging Out

Inspired by the unlikely pairing of shower hoses and leeches, researchers from Japan and the U.K. have created what [they claim](<https://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2019-05/tuot-iba051019.php>) is a first-of-its-kind robot — one that's soft, flexible, and able to move freely on a wall.

"I came up with the idea in the bathroom of my house," Toyohashi University of Technology researcher Ayato Kanada said in a [press release](<https://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2019-05/tuot-iba051019.php>). "The shower hose went wild as if it had a life when I inadvertently turned on the faucet at maximum. Then an idea occurred to me that if I could manipulate a hose, I might be able to make a robot with dynamic movement of living creature."

https://youtu.be/uCISNjwTLgU

## Going Up

The [living creature](<https://futurism.com/military-robots-biobots-south-korea-2024>) Kanada and his colleagues decided to mimic is evident in their bot's name — Longitudinally Extensible Continuum-robot inspired by Hirudinea, or [LEeCH](<https://newatlas.com/leech-climbing-robot/59646/>) — and they describe its creation in a [paper](<https://www.liebertpub.com/doi/10.1089/soro.2018.0115>) published recently in the journal *Soft Robotics.T*

The robot features a leech-inspired suction cup at each end of a long, flexible body. The researchers fashioned the body out of shower hoses, which move through a gear while vacuum pumps control the robot's suction cups.

This design gives LEeCH its ability to not just climb vertical walls, but climb *over* them to reach the opposite side — a skill the researchers suggest could one day prove useful for everything from building inspections to search and rescue missions.

**READ MORE:** [Leech-like climbing robot a world first in free movement](<https://newatlas.com/leech-climbing-robot/59646/>) \[*New Atlas*\]

**More on bio-inspired robots:** *[“Biobots” Will Serve Alongside South Korean Soldiers by 2024](<https://futurism.com/military-robots-biobots-south-korea-2024>)*

### Author social links  
[LinkedIn](<https://www.linkedin.com/in/kristinjhouser>)