From Jules Verne-inspired submarines to NASA-backed underwater habitats, the dream of an undersea civilization came closer than most people realize. More information Adding us as a Preferred Source in Google by using this link indicates that you would like to see more of our content in Google News results. Just as space exploration took off, ocean exploration faced some tragic setbacks. Breakthroughs, discoveries, and DIY tips sent six days a week. By signing up, you confirm you are 16+, will receive newsletters and promotional content and agree to our Terms of Use and acknowledge the data practices in our Privacy Policy .

Robots – some of us love them, some of us worry they are going to take our jobs, and some of us are worried they are going to take over the world. Because of increasingly sophisticated manufacturing processes, and increasingly powerful AI, robots – humanoid or otherwise – are becoming more capable, useful, and – yes – sometimes scary. The first commercial, industrial robots were often immobile, fixed in place, and focused on one task, often working on a production line. Today, however, we're increasingly likely to find them walking on two legs just like us, move around on caterpillar tracks, or even flying through the skies. Some of them are put to work, carrying out boring, repetitive or dangerous tasks to save us from having to do them ourselves.

Video Friday is your weekly selection of awesome robotics videos, collected by your Automaton bloggers. We'll also be posting a weekly calendar of upcoming robotics events for the next few months; here's what we have so far (send us your events!): Let us know if you have suggestions for next week, and enjoy today's videos. We already posted about the Atlas doing parkour video, which Marc Raibert first showed at IROS earlier this month; he also showed this video, which is just as interesting (if not quite as dramatic), since it shows SpotMini in what could be its first realistic commercial application. We have begun field testing the Spot robot for commercial usage around the world.

The US military is funding a radical'shape shifting' underwater robot than can transform between a sub and a humanoid robot. Called Aquanaut, it is billed as a'multipurpose subsea robot' and removes the need for a'mother' vehicle and tethers. Houston Mechatronics, the firm behind the gadget, is backed by the Defense Department. Called Aquanaut, it is billed as a'multipurpose subsea robot' and removes the need for a'mother' vehicle and tethers. Houston Mechatronics, the firm behind the gadget, is backed by the DoD.

Deep ocean robotics is not generally an area where we expect to see much in the way of significant innovation. When we do write about submersible robots, they're usually confined to very near-surface operations. This isn't a total surprise: It seems like the only people who really worry about what's going on in the deep ocean (meaning hundreds or thousands of meters beneath the surface) are the military, the occasional scientist, and the oil and gas industry. Robots are important to these folks, even critical in some cases, but the technology has been more or less stagnant for decades, which is why we don't write about it very frequently. To be fair, there are some very good reasons why it's hard to innovate when it comes to submersible robotics.

Megan McArthur has spent her life messing with microgravity. She was on the team that got the first commercial cargo mission to the International Space Station. She's watched her friends launch in a Soyuz rocket from Kazakhstan. And as a NASA aerospace engineer, she was the flight engineer on the space shuttle's last mission to repair the Hubble Telescope. For Earthlings stuck here in 1G, getting to operate a robotic arm that wrangles Hubble into an airlock might seem like enough excitement for a lifetime.