"The robot carries with it positive and negative charges, and when the walls sees these charges it automatically generates the opposite charge. The robot can then clamp onto those charges.”

The technology is called compliant electroadhesion and allows the robots to crawl up a wall at a speed of about one body length per second, using a very small amount of power.

The robots are being touted for use by the military as reconnaissance, and also for service applications and as toys. The team is now working on a way to apply their technology to more insect-like robots by putting electro-adhesive pads on the robot feet.