This octopus-inspired glove helps humans grip slippery objects

A new high-tech glove totally sucks — and that’s a good thing.

Each fingertip is outfitted with a sucker inspired by those on octopus arms. These suckers allow people to grab slippery, underwater objects without squeezing too tightly, researchers report July 13 in Science Advances.

“Being able to grasp things underwater could be good for search and rescue, it could be good for archaeology, [and] could be good for marine biology,” says mechanical engineer Michael Bartlett of Virginia Tech in Blacksburg.