A tiny diving suit for cyborg cockroaches could let insects breathe and move underwater for hours, opening a surprising path for search-and-rescue tools that can slip into flooded drains, clogged pipes and crushed rubble where people and conventional robots cannot safely go.
Researchers at NTU Singapore and Waseda University built a flexible, waterproof shell that supplies oxygen directly to a cockroach’s breathing openings, allowing the insect to remain active underwater for up to three hours. The idea is to combine a living animal’s natural mobility with minimal electronics so rescue teams get a low-power, highly maneuverable scout for confined, waterlogged spaces.
The core concept behind a cyborg cockroach is simple: small electronics guide a robust insect that already knows how to crawl, squeeze and climb without heavy motors or big batteries. Scientists implant tiny controllers that send signals to the insect’s nervous system, letting people steer or nudge it toward areas that are otherwise unreachable.
The diving suit itself contains an oxygen-generation tank, a soft waterproof outer shell and a set of silicone tubes that connect to the cockroach’s spiracles. Those spiracles are the insect’s natural breathing openings, and routing oxygen to them keeps the animal alive and active even while submerged or moving through low-oxygen sections of a collapsed structure.
To make the oxygen source compact, the team 3D-printed a small clear tank filled with a sponge treated with manganese dioxide, then added a little diluted hydrogen peroxide to trigger a slow release of oxygen. That controlled chemical reaction mimics the function of a diver’s tank on a tiny scale, delivering breathable gas through the suit and into tubes near the spiracles.
Tests used Madagascar hissing cockroaches because they are large, sturdy and wingless, which makes them easier to outfit and steer. In controlled trials, cockroaches wearing the suit stayed active underwater for hours while unprotected insects suffocated within minutes, demonstrating a dramatic improvement in survivability during submersion.
Beyond open water, the team simulated realistic rescue challenges like sequences of carbon dioxide-filled tunnels and submerged passages. The suited insects navigated those hazards and squeezed through tight gaps; with embedded electronics rather than a bulky backpack, a cyborg cockroach passed through a crevice just 2 centimeters high, a size that would trap many small machines.
Practically speaking, a tiny living vehicle that can cross wet and dry terrain while carrying sensors or a camera could help find trapped people, map dangerous voids and inspect flooded infrastructure faster than sending in humans. The next steps the researchers are pursuing include tougher suits, better navigation systems and adding lightweight sensory payloads suitable for field use.
There are practical and ethical questions to address before this becomes a tool for emergency crews: public comfort with using live insects, regulatory hurdles, safety checks and clear protocols for deployment and retrieval. For now, the work is proof of concept, showing how a hybrid approach that combines biology with engineering can solve access problems that purely mechanical robots still struggle with.
