The Boston Globe’s Nidhi Subbaraman reports on Cambridge firm Soft Robotics’ attempt to conquer a new frontier for robot kind — sorting vegetables. Tech to make bots that are safer and more effective graspers are also part and parcel of a new robotic glove being developed at Harvard by Conor Walsh and his team, reports Anna Nowogrodzki. Rethink Robotic’s Rodney Brooks mentioned in a interview the other day that he see improving dexterity as one of the biggest current challenges for the field…

The Japanese government wants to quadruple the size of its robotics sector.

Bots for everything: There’s a Kickstarter on at the moment to fund a new drone for fly-fishing, Aguadrone.

Watch where you’re flying, it though: The Russians are planning to build a microwave gun that disables drones, reports Kelsey Atherton in PopSci.

Update on Philae, the comet bot whose solar resurrection we mentioned earlier this week — the European Space Agency says the bot will be able to perform the experiments they’d originally hoped to do now that she’s back, but communications are still spotty.

An interesting talk from Gui Cavalcanti and Mark Setrakian on the challenges of making humanoid bots. No wonder all those guys were hitting the deck at DARPA….

And finally, in a completely random and senseless bit of badassery, Robot vs. Samurai. (Dat snow pea doh.)