The Crown Jewel of the Spacer Worlds
Aurora was the first world colonized from Earth, settled centuries before the events of the Robot novels. Its early settlers brought advanced robotics technology that allowed a small population to control an entire planet. Over centuries, Aurora became the de facto leader of the fifty Spacer worlds.
At its height, Aurora was a paradise of manicured landscapes, palatial estates, and perfect climate control. Each citizen lived on vast personal estates, attended by dozens of robots. The planet's technology far surpassed Earth's, and Aurorans looked down on the teeming billions of the mother world.
Elijah Baley and the Auroran Crisis
Earth detective Elijah Baley was summoned to Aurora to investigate a crime that Auroran authorities could not solve—or would not. His partnership with the humaniform robot R. Daneel Olivaw on Aurora proved pivotal to galactic history.
Baley's investigation in 'The Robots of Dawn' uncovered a conspiracy involving the creation of humaniform robots and the political struggle between those who wanted to expand into the galaxy and those who preferred isolation. His success led directly to the Settler movement—Earth's colonization of new worlds without robots.
Legacy and Decline
Aurora's fate serves as a cautionary tale. The Spacer worlds' reliance on robots and their refusal to allow immigration or new colonization led to demographic stagnation. As centuries passed, Spacer populations dwindled. By the time of the Galactic Empire, the Spacer worlds were abandoned ruins, their locations largely forgotten.
In 'Foundation and Earth,' Golan Trevize visits the ruins of Aurora and finds it overrun with feral dogs—descendants of the Spacers' pets, now the only living inhabitants of a once-great civilization.