If all goes as planned, this June in Pomona Calif., 25 humanoid robots built by different companies will make their way through an obstacle course meant to resemble a disaster area. Started in 2012, the annual contest is hosted by the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency, the Pentagon's high-tech research unit. DARPA had previously selected eleven companies as finalists. On Thursday, the agency announced the final 14. Gill Pratt, a program manager of the Robotics Challenge, told LiveScience that the participants will have one hour to finish the course, which involvesfirst driving a vehicle to a simulated disaster zone and walking about 30 feet through a field of obstacles. After that the robots must close a valve, do some wiring, cut a hole through a wall, climb stairs, and exit the building, according to the report.

Before NASA sends its first humanoid robot to Mars, it will send it to college – in prototype form, of course. The space agency announced Tuesday will award two Valkyrie robots, a 6-foot-tall, 290-pound humanoid, to Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) in Cambridge, Mass., and Northeastern University in Boston for intensive research and development into the robot's applications in extreme environments. "Advances in robotics, including human-robotic collaboration, are critical to developing the capabilities required for our journey to Mars," said Steve Jurczyk, associate administrator for the Space Technology Mission Directorate (STMD) at NASA Headquarters in Washington. "We are excited to engage these university research groups to help NASA with this next big step in robotics technology development." The space agency became urgently interested in robotics following the 2011 Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Station incident in Japan, which the agency says "illustrated, rather candidly, how inadequate current robotic technologies are for use in highly unstructured human environments."

The next step in artificial intelligence technology may be robot pets, at least according to one animal welfare researcher at the University of Melbourne. In a paper published in the latest edition of the journal Frontiers in Veterinary Science, Dr. Jean-Loup Rault argues that, as the world becomes more populated, pets will become impractical. Those who cannot afford real pets may turn to robotic alternatives. "It's not a question of centuries from now," Dr. Rault wrote in his paper. "If 10 billion human beings live on the planet in 2050 as predicted, it's likely to occur sooner than we think. If you'd described Facebook to someone 20 years ago, they'd think you were crazy. But we are already seeing people form strong emotional bonds with robot dogs in Japan."

Satellites are best known for helping smartphones map driving routes or televisions deliver programs. But now, data from some of the thousands of satellites orbiting Earth are helping track things like crop conditions on rural farms, illegal deforestation, and increasingly, poverty in the hard-to-reach places around the globe. As much as that data has the potential to provide invaluable information to humanitarian organizations, watchdog groups, and policymakers, there is too much of it to sift through in order to draw insights that could influence important decisions. A team of researchers from Stanford University, however, says it has developed an efficient way. By creating a deep-learning algorithm that can recognize signs of poverty in satellite images – such as condition of roads – the team sorted through a million images to accurately identify economic conditions in five African countries, reported the scientists in the journal Science on Thursday.

First it was Amazon drones; now Google is rolling out robots. The tech company revealed it is developing humanoid robots focused on automating daily tasks, according to The New York Times Wednesday, right on the heels of Amazon announcing the development of a drone delivery program, PrimeAir. Though Google remained tight-lipped on where the project stands, and what specific tasks its robots might do, the announcement has spurred conversation on what role artificial intelligence and unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) may play in our future. The project is spearheaded by Google executive Andy Rubin; better known as the engineer who built Google's Android software. He sees the robots as a way to alleviate daily grunt work, possibly in a consumer goods delivery setting.

It's the holy grail of translation, a goal one researcher has called "more complex than building an atomic bomb." Smooth, immediate translations between people speaking different languages would be a remarkable achievement of enormous economic and cultural benefit. Some suggest that it won't happen until computers can express true artificial intelligence - something like C-3PO of "Star Wars" fame, whose knowledge extends far beyond mere vocabulary to an understanding of customs and cultures. Still, researchers are chipping away at the problem. Universal translation is one of 10 emerging technologies that will affect our lives and work "in revolutionary ways" within a decade, Technology Review says.

The "great global brain drain" is how futurist Richard Samson describes it. As the century progresses, he predicts, more and more jobs will be sucked up by technology and sophisticated computers, forcing humans to hone skills machines can't duplicate - at least not yet. Qualities such as ethical judgment, compassion, intuition, responsibility, and creativity will be what stand out in an automated world. With ethics issues spiking into the news almost weekly, the idea of a work world in which individual ethical acumen is viewed as an essential job skill is far from outlandish. The signs are already here.

Cue the John Williams theme and roll the vanishing intro – Obi-Wan Kenobi's Jedi-training droids have arrived on the International Space Station (ISS). Or at least David Miller's versions have arrived. The free-floating spheres are set to test new concepts for "smart" satellites. Able to fly in precision formation, the robots may one day hold the key to building everything from huge space telescopes that can peer deeply into the universe to constellations of small, cheap satellites that can monitor changes on Earth. The shuttle Discovery last week brought the second of three droids that are undergoing experiments as they arrive.

In a decade or so, people may not have to tidy their house, clean up after the dog, or even nag their spouse to do chores. A friendly, human-like robot will take care of routine tasks, and it won't whine or fight back. If technologists' predictions bear out, this second coming of robots could be more pervasive than the first in the '60s, when industrial robots revolutionized manufacturing. Designed to mimic the look and gestures of humans, the new breed of personal robots eventually may have artificial skin and muscles, as well as eye and facial expressions, and they might speak more naturally. But for this rapidly evolving field to take off, scientists will have to improve the quality and reliability of electronics first, and companies will have to find the application that every household must have.

When pet Lila wasn't getting as much playtime as the other two animals in her Plymouth, Mass., home, owner Genie Boutchia felt guilty. Then when a potential new owner came calling with $850 in hand, Ms. Boutchia felt even guiltier. She changed her mind and deemed Lila not for sale. Such feelings of moral responsibility might seem normal, even admirable, in a dog owner. But Lila is not a real dog.