This story is part of our multi-part series looking at some of the big stories and bright ideas primed to make headlines in 2018. Moore's Law describes the exponential technological progress of computer chips. For the past 50 years, every 18 to 24 months, they have shrunk by about half in both size and cost. This enabled the creation of personal computers and cellphones--two devices that have become ubiquitous, which was unfathomable to the average person just 30 years ago. Rapid progress is being made in many fields, including robotics and artificial intelligence.

Technology has come a long way since robots were first introduced into the automotive industry more than 50 years ago. However, although robots can weld, paint and assemble car parts, they are still far from becoming equivalent to human workers, said Taskin Padir, associate professor of electrical and computer engineering at Northeastern University. "The robots we have that are currently state-of-the-art do not come anywhere close to human capabilities, in terms of accuracy and control said Padir. "We still need to make significant improvements on that front." One of the biggest challenges is duplicating the extremely fine finger and hand motions humans can perform. Robots simply don't have the dexterity required to do tasks that are simple for humans, such as tie a knot, strip the casing off a cable, insert a pin in a hole or use a hand tool such as a drill, said Padir. In addition, today's robots lack perception of the world around them and the ability to adjust their actions if their environment changes. "We still needed to work quite a bit on a robot's perception so a robot can look at a tabletop and figure out OK, here is the screwdriver, here is the part that I am assembling, so I better pick up the screwdriver and start working on," said Padir. "Currently what we do is pre-program all of these actions in a sequence that a robot acts out.

Man-machine collaboration could reach new heights far from home, as humanoid robots show potential for deep-space travel. NASA has sent prototype robots to two university groups for further research and development. Initially designed for disaster relief during a previous robotics challenge, the R5 robots could someday be among the first to demonstrate humanoid robot models' usefulness for distant space missions, the space agency suggests. "Advances in robotics, including human-robotic collaboration, are critical to developing the capabilities required for our journey to Mars," Steve Jurczyk, associate administrator for the Space Technology Mission Directorate (STMD) at NASA Headquarters, said in a press release. "We are excited to engage these university research groups to help NASA with this next big step in robotics technology development."