Google's new robot is now even more human

Atlas, the humanoid robot created by Alphabet (GOOGL, Tech30) company Boston Dynamics, can open doors, balance while walking through the snow, place objects on a shelf and pick itself up after being knocked down. The new version of Atlas is smaller and more nimble than its predecessor. It's fully mobile too -- the previous version had to be tethered to a computer. Atlas was created to perform disaster recovery in places unsafe for humans, such as damaged nuclear power plants. The robot made its debut in 2013 during a competition held by the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency. The new version of Atlas is a result of seven computer research teams from around the world who were contracted to develop software to give Atlas a better brain.