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About

Bilge Baytekin is a pioneering researcher at the intersection of soft robotics, bioinspired design, and plant-inspired engineering. Her work fundamentally reimagines how robots can move, sense, and regulate themselves by drawing inspiration from living organisms—particularly plants. Baytekin’s major contributions include the development of untethered miniature soft robots like SQuad (27 citations), which demonstrates sophisticated locomotion without rigid components, and the creation of self-regulating plant robots that exhibit heliotropism and nyctinasty (26 citations)—mimicking sun-tracking and leaf-opening behaviors without electronic feedback. She has also advanced artificial heliotropism using optomechanical feedback (20 citations) and pioneered solvent-driven PDMS sponge actuators and lyotropic hydrogel actuators for tunable, anisotropic motion. Her perspective on plant robotics (20 citations) has helped define this emerging field, bridging bioinspiration and hybrid systems. Baytekin’s work is notable for achieving complex, adaptive behaviors through material intelligence rather than electronics, opening new pathways for sustainable, energy-efficient robotics. With growing citation impact and a clear vision for soft, plant-like machines, she is shaping the future of autonomous, environmentally responsive robots.