R2 is back?

Weighing in at 310 pounds, NASA's newest astronaut is a tad heavier than most spacefarers. And he doesn't have much of a personality.

None, actually.

That's because the soon-to-be seventh member of the International Space Station's crew, R2, is a robot.

And though it may be named R2, with its humanoid appearance this robot looks more like C3P0.

Due to launch in September aboard space shuttle Discovery, R2 is the culmination of more than a decade of development by NASA to produce a robot that could help space station crew members with basic tasks. The station crew will initially experiment with the robot in test mode before allowing it to perform useful tasks.

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