236 real-time system is used to establish the data exchange between the data glove data source and the  DEXHAND. Moreover, the system is used to monitor the communication bus and to provide a TCP/IP communication interface from any standard operating system.   Conclusion   After more than 20 years of torque-controlled lightweight robot development the third generation becomes a useful product now, where we have tried to use all present day available simulation and computational technologies to approach the technical limits. Taking into account its weight of 13-14 kg, its typical power consumption of little more than 100 watts, its load capability of around 8 kg, its motion speed based on maximal joint speeds of 180 deg /sec, it is probably one of the lightest robots that have been built so far. It is the basis for DLR’s future space robot developments .  The presented ROKVISS project has proven the capability of using the lightweight robot and motor unit concepts for space application. The experience acquired with the ROKVISS project influenced many decisions. We believe that upcoming tests and results from analyzing the returned hardware will even further improve the DLR space developments.  Furthermore this paper presented an overview of the DEXHAND project with its 12 motor units, its tendon driven actuation principal and its overall mass of 3 kg. The fingers proved to be capable of applying 25 N at the fingertip, and can withstand 100 N impact loads.  It should be noted that the biggest issue in terms of thermal control of DEXHAND are the digital electronic circuits, the power inverters and not the motors. Indeed, they have very little dissipation capabilities. The EM compatibility issue is mainly solved by using a thick enclosing aluminum shell, for the radiation issues only space qualified parts are used. The used commercial parts are qualified with TID tests. The control system runs entirely in the DEXHAND, complying with the very low communication bandwidth requirements.   Acknowledgment   We would like to thank the Bavarian Ministry that has made mechatronics a key topic of Bavaria’s high tech offensive with lightweight robotics and articulated hands as central demonstrators. The authors would like to thank the DEXHAND and ROKVISS team at DLR, as well as, the ESA for the opportunity to develop an EVA capable hand. The DEXHAND Project has been founded with the ESA Contract No. 21929/08/NL/EM.   References   [1] M. A. Diftler, R. O. Ambrose, S. M. Goza, K. Tyree, and E. Huber, “Robonaut Mobile Autonomy: Initial Experiments,” in IEEE International Conference on Robotics and Automation, Barcelona, Spain, April 2005, pp. 1437 – 1442.  [2] RoboDrive (2009) Website of the RoboDrive GmbH Company. [Online]. Available: http://www.robodrive.de/    [3] G. Hirzinger, N. Sporer, A. Albu-Schäffer, M. Hahnle, R. Krenn, A. Pascucci, and M. Schedl, “Dlr’s torque-controlled light weight robot iii-are we reaching the technological limits now?” in Proc. IEEE Int. Conf. Robotics and Automation ICRA ’02, vol. 2, 2002, pp. 1710–1716.  [4] G. Niemeyer, C. Preusche, and G. Hirzinger, Handbook of Robotics. Springer Verlag, 2008, vol. ISBN 978-3-540-23957-4, ch. Telerobotics.