Kirobo, the world’s first talking ‘robot astronaut’, heads for International Space Station

By Trevor Mogg Published April 28, 2022

When Japanese astronaut Koich Wakata arrives at the International Space Station (ISS) later this year, waiting to greet him will be a small robot called Kirobo. Wakata and Kirobo are set to spend many happy hours shooting the breeze together, admiring views of the Earth and generally hanging out just like any other pair of pals.

The world’s first talking humanoid astronaut blasted into space from Japan Sunday morning on a mission to the ISS. Kirobo, which stands 34 centimeters from head-to-toe and weighs only 1 kilogram, is traveling to the ISS together with five tons of supplies for the current crew, the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA) said.

Recommended Videos

Designed by Tomotaka Takahashi of the University of Tokyo’s Research Center for Advanced Science and Technology (RCAST), Robo Garage of Kyoto University, and ad firm Dentsu, Kirobo and Wakata will conduct the first ever space-based communication experiments between a robot and a human.

Emotional

The talking robot features voice recognition capabilities and telecommunications functions. The ability to process natural language and respond to different facial expressions should also serve to make conversations more natural. Kirobo will even show emotion when it meets with Wakata in space as the pair are already acquainted with one another having met prior to the robot’s departure on Sunday. Yes, there could be tears at the reunion, or whatever Kirobo is designed to do in such emotional circumstances.

Another of Kirobo’s mission aims is to see how, or indeed if, machines like this can be a source of emotional support for people isolated over lengthy periods of time. Japan’s aging population means its citizens are living increasingly solitary lives and so researchers believe robots that can interact and show emotion could prove invaulable in the future.

“I wish for this robot to function as a mediator between a person and machine, or a person and the Internet, and sometimes even between people,” creator Takahashi said.

Prior to launch, Kirobo described his mission to the ISS as “one small step for me, a giant leap for robots.”

[via BBC]

Contributing Editor

Not so many moons ago, Trevor moved from one tea-loving island nation that drives on the left (Britain) to another (Japan)…

Topics

Space

Lightsails have hit another speed bump on the road to interstellar travel

The coolest interstellar travel idea may get betrayed by the light pushing it

LightSail in Earth orbit

Laser-powered lightsails are one of the coolest answers to spaceflight. It might not be as sci-fi-sounding as a warp drive, but now, its practicality has also come under question. Using lightsails, a spacecraft could unfurl an ultra-thin reflective sail and let a powerful laser push it toward another star, without relying on fuel.

The tech was simple and elegant--except it's also more complicated than it sounds. A new preprint from researchers Chao Shen and Jiaze Li of the Harbin Institute of Technology suggests that relativistic lightsails may run into a hidden propulsion problem once they start moving extremely fast.

Space

The galaxy has an exoplanet size mystery, and NASA’s EVE mission wants to solve it

This planet-hunting mission wants to catch baby worlds before they grow up

Artist’s Illustration of Exoplanets Orbiting Barnard’s Star

Mankind venturing into space ended up creating more questions than it answered, and one of the dilemmas is related to the planet sizes. Astronomers have found plenty of rocky super-Earths and plenty of puffier sub-Neptunes, but far fewer planets with a radius of about 1.8 times Earth’s.

That gap is known as the radius valley, and a proposed mission called the Early eVolution Explorer, or EVE, wants to figure out why it exists. NASA has a simple plan: look at planets while they are still young. The mission concept, detailed in a new arXiv preprint and covered by Phys.org, would focus on newly formed star clusters to see what small planets look like before billions of years of evolution.

Cars

We just got a hot signal that a Tesla and SpaceX merger could happen, after all

Tesla

For years, the idea of Tesla and SpaceX becoming a single company has lived somewhere between ambitious business theory and Elon Musk fan fiction. The two companies already share DNA, leadership influence, engineering talent, and long-term goals. But every time the topic surfaced, it felt more like an interesting thought experiment than a realistic possibility. Now, one of the most important people at SpaceX has added fresh fuel to the conversation.

Speaking in a recent CNBC interview, SpaceX President and COO Gwynne Shotwell was asked about the possibility of closer ties between Tesla and SpaceX. Her response wasn’t a flat-out denial. In fact, she suggested that bringing the two companies together could make life a little easier for Musk. That may sound like an offhand comment, but coming from Shotwell, it’s noteworthy. She’s been at SpaceX since its earliest days and remains one of the company's most influential executives.