Playing a mob boss in a video game might not seem all that serious for a veteran actor who has appeared on feature films and television. For George Takei, however, performing the role of Masumi Arakawa in "Yakuza: Like a Dragon," is akin to his life coming full circle. Takei was only six years old when he was first introduced to the concept of "benshi" -- Japanese performers who narrated for silent films. It was a discovery that happened to coincide with a dark period in American history. At the time, Takei and his family were staying in Arkansas, part of some 120,000 Japanese-Americans who were gathered into internment camps after Pearl Harbor was bombed on Dec. 7, 1941.

The dream of having a robot do the dishes may get a step closer with a touch-sensitive electronic skin made of flexible sensors, according to engineers at University of California at Berkeley. And presumably, it wouldn't get dishpan hands. In a letter published by Nature Materials, the researchers describe a low-power but robust material that would have some of the properties of human skin, such as the ability to feel and touch. Such artificial skin might also help restore limb feeling to amputees. The e-skin is based on inorganic single crystalline semiconductors.