Biohybrid robots, machines that move using living muscle, have taken a big step forward at ETH Zurich. In a release dated 22 October 2026, the university says its researchers have, for the first time, designed lab-grown muscle tissue and a soft scaffold together on a computer at the centimetre scale. The resulting robots can jump, swim, walk and grasp, with a range of motion up to 11 times greater than earlier systems using comparable muscle tissue. This article is based on that ETH Zurich release and the underlying study in Nature Communications, which was published on 11 September 2026.
What ETH Zurich built with biohybrid robots
The robots are powered by bioactuators, small strips of muscle tissue grown in the lab from mouse muscle cells. Each bioactuator is about 1.5 centimetres long. The muscle sits on a soft hydrogel scaffold, and when the tissue contracts, the scaffold bends and the robot moves.
ETH Zurich describes four versions: a jumper, a swimmer, a walker and a gripper. A single muscle contraction lifts the jumping robot about 5 millimetres, roughly a third of its body length. The walking robot covers 6.2 millimetres per second, which the university says is faster relative to its body length than any walking biohybrid robot reported so far.
Co-lead author Aiste Balciunaite explained the difference from earlier work: “With previous systems, you sometimes had to look under a microscope to see the flexing.”
How the biohybrid robots were designed on a computer
Earlier muscle-powered robots usually started from a fixed shape. The ETH Zurich team took the opposite route. “Instead of specifying a fixed form for our muscle geometry, we wanted to design the whole thing from scratch on the computer,” says co-lead author Mike Y. Michelis.
The team simulated the muscle tissue and the scaffold together, then used an algorithm to search for the configurations that produced the most movement. Fine grooves in the scaffold anchor the tissue and help align its muscle fibres, which matters because aligned fibres contract more effectively.
The scaffolds were 3D-printed using a technique called xolography. According to the release, each scaffold took about one minute to print.
Who is behind the work
The research comes from the Soft Robotics Lab led by Professor Robert Katzschmann. Balciunaite and Michelis are the co-lead authors of the paper. “We’re just beginning to build robots in a more natural way,” Katzschmann says in the release.
For readers following soft machines, this sits alongside other recent robotics research we have covered, such as the robotic metamaterial that generates its own rhythm.
The limits of biohybrid robots today
ETH Zurich is clear that these robots are not ready to leave the lab. The living tissue needs a nutrient solution to survive, so the robots cannot simply operate in open air. Building larger systems would require something like an artificial vascular system to feed thicker tissue. Living tissue also varies from batch to batch, which makes behaviour less predictable than with conventional motors.
The peer-reviewed paper itself appeared in September 2026; what is new this week is the university’s release.
The case for and against
The case for the work is that it changes the design process. Instead of trial and error with hand-shaped tissue, the team used simulation to find shapes that move far more, and a fast printing method to make them.
The case for caution is practical. The robots are about a centimetre and a half long, depend on a nutrient bath and use mouse cells. Scaling up, keeping tissue alive and making performance consistent are all still open problems, as the researchers themselves say.
My view on biohybrid robots
As a writer, I feel the most interesting part here is not the jumping or swimming, but the idea of designing living and non-living parts together from the start. I would treat this as a strong research step rather than a product, and I will be watching for whether the team can solve the nutrient and scaling problems.
FAQ: ETH Zurich biohybrid robots
What are biohybrid robots?
They are robots that combine living tissue with artificial materials. In this case, lab-grown muscle tissue from mouse cells contracts to move a soft hydrogel scaffold.
What can the ETH Zurich robots do?
The team built versions that jump, swim, walk and grasp. The walker moves at 6.2 mm per second, and the jumper rises about 5 mm with one contraction.
Can these robots work outside the lab?
Not yet. They need a nutrient solution to keep the tissue alive, and larger versions would need an artificial vascular system.