QUIRKY WORLD ... Robot Boris is a dab hand with dishwasher

ROBOT BORIS

But there the similarity to London mayor Boris Johnson ends. Boris 2 is a robot with giant blue arms and huge grasping hands — and even though scientists considered giving him a blonde wig, they decided against the idea. His bold vision is not blazing a trail to Number 10 Downing Street, but loading a dishwasher.

This is no mean feat for a machine, according to roboteer Jeremy Wyatt from the University of Birmingham’s School of Computing Science.