The first humanoid robot in space, Kirobo, spoke to a Japanese astronaut and said that he does not mind the weightlessness in the International Space Station, and that he would like to receive a toy - a rocket - from Santa Claus.
Videos of Kirobo and astronaut Koići Wakata chatting in Japanese were released today, and the conversation took place as part of an experiment to test the robot's functions.
Vakata told the robot-astronaut that he was glad to meet them and asked him how he felt in the zero-gravity station, to which Kirobo replied, "I'm already used to it, no problem".
Kirobo said, among other things, that he expects Santa Claus to bring him a rocket.
Japanese scientist Tomotaka Takahashi, who developed the robot, said that it was impossible to guess how Kirobo would cope in such situations because he was not programmed to give "ready-made" answers, but had to spell out sentences himself, using terms from his dictionary.
Kirobo, 34 centimeters tall, was sent into space in August from Tanegashima, in southwestern Japan.
Before taking off, Kirobo told reporters in the style of Neil Armstrong: "This is one small step for me, but one big step for the robots".
photo: reuters
The robot is named Kirobo, from two Japanese words meaning "hope" and "robot".
The biggest challenge for the designers was to create a robot that could move and speak in zero-gravity space.
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