Robots, part III

Robots continue to grow in their importance amongst law enforcement, military use, medical research and care, space exploration and entertainment, among other tasks. Robots recently in the news include Russia's decades-old Lunokhod rovers - recently photographed from Lunar orbit, the naming of 'Curiosity', NASA's next Mars rover, and a robotic dental patient, designed for realistic training. Collected here are a handful of relatively recent photographs of robots around the world - and the solar system.

A robotic hand which has been designed to aid army bomb disposal personnel is demonstrated by Rich Walker of Shadow Robot Company at the Centre for Defence Enterprise in Oxford, in central England, on February 11, 2010. (BEN STANSALL/AFP/Getty Images)