Robot set to chat with humans — in space

The world’s first space conversation experiment between a robot and humans is ready to be launched.

Developers from the Kirobo project, named after “kibo” or hope in Japanese and “robot”, gathered in Tokyo to demonstrate the humanoid robot’s ability to talk.

In a scene straight out of Star Wars, the pint-sized Kirobo fielded questions from curious journalists who asked what it was going to do in space.