Space shuttle Endeavour will head off to space on Tuesday with an eighth passenger – $210 million dollar Dextre, a robot designed to take the place of astronauts for risky jobs in outer space.

The robot has two arms, each with seven joints that allow the limb to twist and bend more than a human arm. Each of its two hands has pincers to grip objects and built-in socket wrenches to drive bolts.

The robot is going into space in nine pieces. The crew of Endeavour will assemble it over the course of three spacewalks and place it on the International Space Station ready for it to begin operation in 2009. Once assembled, Dextre will be able to handle items as small as a phone book and as big as a phone booth.

Once in operation, Dextre will be able to replace nearly 140 parts of the station, such as batteries and circuit boxes using a sense of touch, which will allow it to ‘feel’ when it needs to apply more force to slide a component into place. It’s expected to aid astronauts not only with spacewalks but making repairs.

Dextre can be operated by either Mission Control or the crew living on the ISS. It is expected that the robot will make repairs to the station as often as six times a year.

Read more at USA Today