The futuristic warplanes and weapons, the Na'vis, the sentient extraterrestrial humanoids inhabiting the fictional moon Pandora in the movie 'Avatar's had to battle against, is set to become a reality, thanks to DARPA (Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency), which plans to make an army of 'Avatar'- style surrogate robots to reduce the dangers posed to military soldiers in the battlefield, featuring telepresence and remote operation of a ground system.

According to a report by Wired, the research wing of the U.S. Pentagon has allocated $7 million out of $2.8 billion budget for 2012 to test the new technology. The project is called 'Avatar,' inspired by the 2009 blockbuster James Cameron movie.

The Avatar program will develop interfaces and algorithms to enable a soldier to effectively partner with a semi-autonomous bi-pedal machine and allow it to act as the soldier's surrogate, Wired quoted the agency as saying.

The surrogate robots' work will include room clearing, sentry control [and] combat casualty recovery.

DARPA has been working with Boston Dynamic's Petman, a anthropomorphic robot for testing chemical protection clothing used by U.S. military personnel, according to IEEE fining.

We have absolutely no evidence to suggest Petman is anything more than a chemical-protection clothing tester except for the fact that just testing suits seems like a slightly ridiculous use for a freakin' super advanced bipedal humanoid soldier robot, the filing said.

In addition to Petman, Boston Dynamic's LS3 (Legged Squad Support System) or the so-called AlphaDog, a dynamic robot designed to go anywhere soldiers and marines go on foot, is also expected to bring great advancement in the 'Avatar' project.

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