NASA's 'Robonaut' will walk in space.

• Author: Foster, Sharon
• Position: Tech Talk

The "Star Wars" movie series may be closer to reality than we thought. NASA is developing a humanoid robot, called Robonaut, to function like an astronaut and perform spacewalks.

Robonaut was designed to help humans work and explore in space, said Chris Culbert, chief of robotic systems at NASA. The robot has a humanoid shape. It is equipped with a dexterous five-fingered hand and human-scale arm.

The robot's hand can grasp and manipulate objects that are not designed to be compatible with robots. Its two arms are designed to be equivalent to human strength, scale, reach and dexterity. Its head has two eyes and a neck with two...