A new Italian bionic hand is more sensitive than limbs made of flesh and blood, it was claimed at a robotics conference in Rome Thursday. The hand made by Biorobotica was first pioneered by researcher Paolo Dario in the 1980s, who created the first connection to a nervous system. The hand enables users to orient in the dark, researchers said, while its neural interface enables people to feel shapes.

The invention is the fruit of a collaboration between Silvestro Micera, of the Scuola Superiore Sant'Anna in Pisa an the Politecnico Federale in Lausanne, and Paolo Maria Rossini, of the Rome teaching hospital Policlinico universitario Agostino Gemelli - Università Cattolica di Roma.