Astrobotic Technology Inc., the Carnegie Mellon University spin-off headed by William “Red” Whittaker, has signed a contract with SpaceX to launch Astrobotic’s exploration robot to the Moon atop one of the company’s Falcon 9 boosters. The mission could launch as soon as December 2013.

Professor Manuela Veloso and her work regarding robot soccer are featured in a video available on the website of NOVA, PBS's top science documentary series. The Feb. 9 episode of NOVA, airing at 10 p.m. on WQED in Pittsburgh, is "Smartest Machine on Earth" and includes interviews regading artificial intelligence with several Carnegie Mellon faculty members.

Many video games boast life-like graphics and realistic game play, but have no connection with reality. A new online game developed by Carnegie Mellon University and Stanford University researchers, however, finally shatters the virtual wall. The game, called EteRNA (http://eterna.cmu.edu), harnesses game play to uncover principles for designing molecules of RNA, which biologists believe may be the key regulator of everything that happens in living cells. But the game doesn’t end with the highest computer score. Rather, players are scored and ranked based on how well their virtual designs can be rendered as real, physical molecules.

The Carnegie Museum of Natural History has extended through July its display of the juried gallery show from last fall’s Fine International Conference on Gigapixel Imaging for Science.

Plum TV’s “Masters of Innovation” series and host Jim Brasher visited Carnegie Mellon and the Robotics Institute to see the future of robotics, including snake robots, robot soccer and HERB, the robotic butler. Watch the video here.

Carnegie Mellon University spin-out Astrobotic Technology has received the first $500,000 task order from the $10 million contract that NASA awarded the company in October. The order will help the company design, build and test the primary structure for its lunar lander.

The two-story Open Oceans tank at the Pittsburgh Zoo & PPG Aquarium contains 100,000 gallons of salt water, 30 species of sea life – and one submersible robot, or Reefbot, named CLEO. Visitors can remotely pilot CLEO and view the tank's occupants through the robot's video camera.

Manuela M. Veloso, a professor of computer science at Carnegie Mellon University, has been named a fellow of the Institute for Electronic and Electrical Engineers (IEEE) for her contributions to the development of cognition, perception and action in autonomous robot teams.

The National Science Foundation (NSF) has extended its support for an alliance of nine major research universities, including Carnegie Mellon University, and 19 historically black colleges and universities (HBCUs) that encourages African American students to pursue graduate training and research careers in robotics and computer science.

A 60-second feature on Boss, the self-driving SUV developed at the Robotics Institute, will debut Tuesday, Dec. 7, during one of the commercial breaks of Mantracker, a Science Channel series that airs at 10 p.m. Tuesdays. The feature is part of a series on scientific research called Innovation Nation that was produced for the National Science Foundation.