Modeling the mechanics of the strongest punch in the animal kingdom, researchers built a robot that mimics the movement of the mantis shrimp, whose club-like appendages accelerate faster than a bullet out of a gun. Just one strike can knock the arm off a crab or break through a snail shell.
Researchers at Harvard University and Duke University closely mimicked the geometry of a mantis shrimp's physiology, exceeding accelerations produced by limbs in other robotic devices by more than tenfold. The team first studied the linkage mechanics of the system, then built a physical robotic model.