This autonomous solar-powered robot costs 1p, is smaller than a grain of salt, and communicates through 'wiggles of a little dance'

Autonomous solar-powered robot.

• Researchers created fully autonomous robots smaller than a grain of salt
• Robots swim using electrical fields to manipulate ions in the surrounding fluid
• The propulsion system allows coordinated movement and speeds up to one body length per second

Researchers at the University of Pennsylvania and the University of Michigan claim to have created the world’s smallest fully programmable, autonomous robots.