
This week Hitachi is finally ready to send its snake/crawler hybrid robot into the heart of Fukushima Daiichi’s severely melted-down reactor #1, and a Japanese booze maker that owns an American booze maker wants to get cozier and it’s kind of funny.
In addition to the most visible and flashy robotics projects, there is a burgeoning world of robotics development out there set to spark the imaginations of another generation of nerd and engineering culture and beyond. This year, we will see some truly amazing things – things the media have barely touched on, and not all of it revolves around Google.