Adorable astronaut pal Kirobo enjoys first face-to-face, in-space chat

Adorable, robotic astronaut pal Kirobo has enjoyed his first face-to-face, in-space conversation with Japanese astronaut Koichi Wakata, who is testing out the little bot's autonomous conversation skills.

Kirobo is the first humanoid robot to go into space and instead of giving pre-programmed responses to questions he processes them and constructs the answers from a pool of vocabulary.

In a video showing the interaction between the two, Wakata can be seen saying: "I've been looking forward to meeting you, Kirobo, for such a long time."

"Me too, I've always wanted to meet you," replies Kirobo, who set off for the International Space Station in August, where he waited for Wakata, who then arrived in November.

Conversation was a little stilted, with pauses in between questions and answers, but the robot's conversation improves and gets smoother all the time.
"We've had some trouble before having the robot carry on the conversation smoothly," AFP  reports Kirobo's developer Tomotaka Takahashi as saying.
"When people develop a relationship, it is an accumulation of small bits of communication. Small things make it work or not work," he said. "We've learnt important tips to develop a robot that can communicate with people more."
Kirobo also told Wakata that he's enjoying zero gravity and that he's going to ask Santa for a rocket for Christmas, presumably so he can go explore further afield.
"What kind of training have you done?" Wakata asks Kirobo.
"I was trained to talk to people," answers the robot.
Kirobo might know what he's doing, but it's doubtful that he knows why he's doing it. He has no idea that the experiment is being conducted in the hope of facilitating the coexistence of humans and robots in the future, and maybe even deploying communication robots in outer space.

He was designed though as a companion for isolated people, and is the product of a collaborative project between advertising firm Dentsu, the University of Tokyo, robot developer Robo Garage and Toyota. Kirobo is scheduled to return to Earth in December 2014, so let's hope he and Wakata continue to be chums.