The wildest things Google owns (pictures)

Before we start, a caveat: Yeah, Google is now owned by an umbrella company called Alphabet. And it's Alphabet that owns many of these crazy-cool technologies. But the people who own Alphabet are, essentially, Google's top brass. You'll forgive us the minor liberty.

Why have contacts that just help you see? According to Google, the company is developing a smart contact lens that's "built to measure glucose levels in tears using a tiny wireless chip and miniaturized glucose sensor that are embedded between two layers of soft contact lens material."

This year Google registered a device with the U.S. Patent Office that detects body odors and seeks to eliminate them. Yep. Really.

Google has acquired Boston Dynamics, a company devoted to "changing your idea of what robots can do." Among their robots includes one called Petman, which is developed to move like a human and test chemical conditions.

Another robot they're developing, called Atlas, is basically the Terminator.

And let's not forget their robotic menagerie, which includes Cheetah, "the fastest legged robot in the world," RiSE, which climbs buildings like a bug, and BigDog, an advanced rough-terrain robot.

What's Calico Labs working on? Oh, they're just researching how to defeat aging forever.

The Google Cultural Institute gathers international collections and exhibits from museums as well as archives worldwide (including, yep, works of Salvador Dali), and brings them to anyone with an Internet connection. Price tag: your soul (just kidding, it's free).

Essentially, these are tiny magnetic robots that go into your blood. These nano-particles would bind themselves to molecules and identify potential illnesses.

As if blood robots weren't freaky enough, Google is also developing synthetic skin. You know. So their nanoparticles can talk to you. Maybe it'll look like this. Maybe it'll look even freakier.

In their quest to develop artificial intelligence, Google has developed machine technology that, among other things, can detect a YouTube cat video.

Technically they don't own your DNA. Yet. But through Google Genomics, Google is looking to build a cloud-based library of genomic data. How Gattaca of them.

Didn't know this could be patented? Well it can, and Google did it. Why? So you can use the gesture to "like" things via technology like Google Glass.

A digital microphone that would be tattooed into the user's throat is another invention Google potentially wants to develop. The patent (which Google acquired via a Motorola Mobility subsidiary) describes a wireless device that is able to transmit the sound of a user's voice to devices like smartphones.

Google is looking to land on the moon by funding the Google Lunar XPRIZE, which has contestants racing to land a robot on our friendly lunar satellite.

Through the company Makani Energy, Google X is looking to develop clean, green energy by the use of wind machines that generate power through kites.

Project Loon is Google's attempt to bring Internet everywhere. Balloons would carry signals to parts of the world that still don't have Internet access.

Google owns Zagat, the famous travel guide to, well, everything, including top restaurants like this one. Why? We're guessing it's an attempt to bring Google Maps to the next level.

Another initiative, called Project Tango, is Google's stab at combining 3D motion with mapping. The goal of the project is to have software on your phone that's the digital replica of a human eye.

This isn't your typical Times Square billboard. Patented by Google in 2008, this sensor, once placed in a smartphone, could read temperature, light, humidity, sound and the chemical composition of the air around it. Ads would then change based on those readings.

Google owns Lift Labs, which developed Liftware, a spoon that helps people with tremors eat by using stabilizing technology.

Does Google own the third dimension? Of course not. Does it own a database where you can download a plethora of 3D designs to print? Yep. There's so many, they even call it a warehouse.

Google acquired startup Flutter so they could own Flutter's hand-gesture-interfacing, motion-technology work.

Through Project Art, Google allows you to virtually tour thousands of masterpieces from various museums and collections.

Yet another competitor in the self-driving car race, Google has already made prototypes and tested vehicles that, well, drive themselves.

Ok, they may not own the letters A-Z. But they do own the name "Alphabet," as it's the moniker of Google's new parent company.

Skybox imaging was obtained by Google in 2014. The company provides commercial, high resolution satellite imagery of Earth. So now Google is literally watching you from space.

Google Fonts is a cloud-based network of thousands of fonts that you can download for free, so even your typing has the Google touch.

If you use a walking stick, you obviously want it to take pictures of the glorious vista you just hiked to see, so Google, of course, owns a patent for an invention that would do just that.

In 2011, Google bought a patent for technology that would allow your computer or smartphone to wittily post all those social media status updates for you -- basically, your virtual social Jeeves.

Not satisfied with having a robot army of destruction, Google also wants those robots to be smart. Hence their research into machine and artificial intelligence which, among other things, has been able to learn how to play all those classic 80s video games.

If you didn't understand why your Gmail is connected to the video-sharing behemoth, well, here's the answer: Google acquired YouTube in 2006 for $1.65 billion.

Yet another patent owned by Google is a social network that allows users to share and create their own comics.

Acquired by Google in 2014, Nest, formerly Dropcam, let's you spy on yourself. Or others. It's also expanding its products to create a smart home.