Italy has produced the first robot in the world that thinks out loud and so learns new things like children, arousing empathy in humans. The robot has been created by two Palermo University experts, Arianna Pipitone and Antonio Chella.

Pipitone is an expert in computational models for language and Chella an expert in informatics and robotics. Their research, published in the iScience journal, is an important step towards a more effective communication between humans and machines.