The robots have taken over Carnegie Science Center.

"roboworld," the Science Center's new permanent robotics exhibit, was fully deployed yesterday. The 6,000-square-foot exhibit takes up residence in the large second-floor area formerly used for traveling exhibits.

The science center has a long history of developing exhibits based on robotics. In 1986, it produced "Real, Live Robots," and in 1996 launched the touring exhibit "Robotics." This region is a hub of robotic research and development, and many of the exhibits feature robots created by local companies. "roboworld" cost $3.5 million to produce and the price tag would have been higher if several companies hadn't donated robots and other hardware to build the exhibits.

The new exhibit balances science fact and fiction, with displays devoted to real robots and to famous ones that were featured in sci-fi shows and movies, along with interactive displays that show how they work.

Andy the RoboThespian, a greeter robot at the exhibit entrance, introduces visitors to what they're about to see. Visitors can control his movements, eyes and facial expressions, and he answers pre-programmed questions about robotics. Andy also has more than 300 followers on Facebook.

Carnegie Mellon University's Robot Hall of Fame has a new home here. The exhibit features scale replicas of high-profile robots, including R2-D2 and C-3PO of "Star Wars" fame, Gort ("The Day the Earth Stood Still"), Robby ("Forbidden Planet"), Hal 9000 ("2001: A Space Odyssey"), TV's chatty "Lost in Space" robot, and Dewey from "Silent Running." It also features one of the earliest robot movie stars -- Maria from the 1927 film "Metropolis."

Future Hall of Fame inductees will be added to the exhibit next year, including the DaVinci Medical Robot System, iRobot's Roomba vacuum cleaner, the assassin cyborg from "The Terminator" (1984) and NASA's Mars Rovers.

Visitors can have photos taken with one of the Hall of Fame robots. The Holopix station combines digital images of the robot against different backgrounds with the image of the person it photographs. When visitors get home, the photo will be waiting in their e-mail inbox.

Several of the robots are there to compete with humans, and the odds aren't in our favor. Air Hockeybot 1000 is an industrial robot arm with a serious goalie defense capability. But Hockeybot is more than the world's most challenging air hockey game. A display panel on the exhibit shows the data streams that track the puck's movement, giving visitors an X-ray view of the complex science behind these robots. Only two of these exist: The other is the original prototype developed by Nuvation of San Jose, Calif.

Visitors can compete against robots in two other exhibits. In StarKick Foosball, they play foosball against a robotic opponent. StarKick is here on a five-year loan from Germany's Espelkamp Gauselmann Group. The robot basketball-throwing arm, which was part of the Science Center's traveling exhibit, finds a permanent home here.

Sketch Robot is driven by software from Pittsburgh-based Integrated Industrial Technologies. In this interactive exhibit, visitors draw a picture on a touch screen. The industrial spiderbot processes the information and rapidly places marbles on a platform to duplicate the image.

Among the working robots featured are Solo, which explores water and sewer pipes and was developed by Pittsburgh-based RedZone; and IBM's Pong, a robot used in marketing research that gauges and responds to facial expressions.

The robot Family Tree uses I-Wall technology to create a detailed illustrated timeline of real and sci-fi robots, starting with drawings by Leonardo da Vinci and ending with Pixar's "Wall-E." New developments will be added to the family tree as they happen. Although it's a permanent exhibit, "roboworld" will be constantly changing and evolving to reflect technological developments.