Clearpath Robotics was founded six years ago by three college buddies with a passion for building stuff. Its 80 employees specialize in all-terrain test rigs like the Husky, a stout four-wheeled robot vehicle used by researchers within the Department of Defense. They make drones too, and have even built a robotic boat called the Kingfisher. But there is one thing they will never, ever build: a robot that can kill. Clearpath is the first and, so far as we can tell, only robotics company to pledge not to build killer robots.

Humans have launched thousands of satellites into orbit, many of which are now useless and dangerously in the way of future space missions. NASA wants this space junk cleared out, but many pieces are spinning so wildly that they would be dangerous to collect. To solve this problem, a team from MIT has come up with an algorithm that could let cleanup crews measure a target's movement so they can plan an approach to safely snatch it up. The team sent their algorithm up to the International Space Station, where astronauts tested it using two SPHERES satellites, volleyball-sized bots being tested as swarming space helpers. As one satellite floated and spun, another filmed the action using a pair of linked cameras, spaced slightly apart.

The silver, three-wheeled RAVEN moon rover is the size of a golf cart, weighs 800 pounds, and is powered by two super-size car batteries. Its "brain" is the same kind of computer processor found in a netbook. Students in the Department of Aerospace Engineering's Space Systems Laboratory built the rover, which won a NASA design competition. As a smart, mobile assistant for astronauts, the rover and its robotic arm theoretically could follow instructions to bore holes into the moon's surface, collect rock samples and even carry an astronaut to safety in an emergency. Space systems lab students also designed a companion spacesuit to allow an astronaut to give the rover voice and keypad commands remotely.

Dr. Hodes was at the forefront of computer-related research at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and the National Institutes of Health. While working toward his doctorate in mathematic logic at MIT from 1957 to 1962, he studied under two founders of theoretical computer science and artificial intelligence, Marvin Minsky and John McCarthy. Dr. Hodes was a member of the artificial intelligence group of the MIT Research Laboratory of Electronics and did pioneering work in the development of the computer programming language LISP, which was used in artificial intelligence research. He also is credited with being one of the first people to recognize that logic could be used as a programming language. In 1966, Dr. Hodes joined NIH and worked in the artificial intelligence laboratory before moving to the National Cancer Institute.

This has bad results, of course, if you're a human. But not so much if you're a robot and have as many legs as a centipede sticking out from your body. That's why Mark Tilden, a robotics physicist at the Los Alamos National Laboratory, built something like that. At the Yuma Test Grounds in Arizona, the autonomous robot, 5 feet long and modeled on a stick-insect, strutted out for a live-fire test and worked beautifully, he says. Every time it found a mine, blew it up and lost a limb, it picked itself up and readjusted to move forward on its remaining legs, continuing to clear a path through the minefield.

Imagine a computer that could sift through millions of financial transactions in real time to detect fraud or look for signs of insider trading, and do it exponentially faster than the most powerful computers in the world today. A Washington start-up is betting that such a machine can be built in the not-too-distant future, using the mysterious principles of quantum computing. QxBranch (pronounced Q-Branch) is the latest project by Michael Brett, an Australian entrepreneur whose previous venture, Aerospace Concepts, teamed up with Lockheed Martin last year to explore the futuristic realm of super-fast quantum computers. QxBranch -- a spinoff from Aerospace Concepts -- was born out of that collaboration and develops and tests commercial applications for quantum computing. The company has Lockheed's recently retired chief technology officer, Ray Johnson, on its board of directors.

It is difficult to determine exactly how much money is going into research at universities because government contracts also go to corporations, such as Boeing, that work closely with schools like Carnegie Mellon. Northrop Grumman Corp., Intel Corp. are among other companies that have sponsored university research or maintain their own robotics projects.

"Everyone is trying to see if they can catch the fraud before the check goes out the door," says Andrea Allmon, director of health care operations at Fair Isaac, a firm known for its credit card scoring model that also sells health fraud detection computer systems. That's because companies can save far more money by stopping claims before they are paid than trying to get fraudsters to pay back money. Insurer Aetna says its new computer software helped it stop $89 million in payments before they reached medical providers last year. That compares with the $15 million in fraud repayments it was able to collect after the fact. But many states require medical claims to be paid promptly, which means insurers must be able to review claims, spot problems and do investigations very quickly.

The regulator said: "We agree with Google its [self-driving car] will not have a'driver' in the traditional sense that vehicles have had drivers during the last more than one hundred years." Google's self-driving car just got a boost from the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration. SAN FRANCISCO - Google's pioneering effort to develop a self-driving vehicle devoid of steering wheel and pedals just got a boost from the feds. In a Feb. 4 letter to Google Car project director Chris Urmson that was first reported by Reuters, the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration noted it "will interpret'driver' in the context of Google's described motor vehicle design as referring to the (self-driving system), and not to any of the vehicle occupants," adding that "we agree with Google its (self-driving car) will not have a'driver' in the traditional sense that vehicles have had drivers during the last more than one hundred years." Google's seven-year-old program has evolved from a fleet of radar- and laser-packed Lexus SUVs to now include a small two-passenger vehicle whose ultimate design will not allow passengers to drive the car.

SAN FRANCISCO -- Google is putting its search engine in the hands of its artificial intelligence chief. John Giannandrea will take over from Amit Singhal who is leaving Google this month after 15 years. The move shows the ascendance and growing importance of artificial intelligence at the major Silicon Valley technology companies. Search is the engine that drives Google's lucrative advertising business. Artificial intelligence is increasingly behind advances in how Google answers search queries.