The robots will see you now

For more than a decade, biomimetic robots have been deployed alongside live animals to better understand the drivers of animal behavior, including social cues, fear, leadership, and even courtship. The encounters have always been unidirectional; the animals observe and respond to the robots. But in the lab of Maurizio Porfiri, a professor of mechanical and aerospace engineering at the NYU Tandon School of Engineering, the robots can now watch back.