Scientists are developing a pill-sized robot that is looking for cancer by travelling through the body.

The pill will be able to transmit findings back to a computer and have a miniature video camera to capture around 40,000 images of the intestines.

Because the camera images are instantly beamed back to a PC, there is no need to retrieve the robot. It just passes through the body naturally and disappears down the toilet.

The invention is based on existing camera technology called PillCam- announce the Daily Mail.