The age of the superhero suit is upon us

Its rock-hard surface can take a full- on assault from a baseball bat, yet remains flexible enough to allow you to kick, leap and roll with perfect ease. Crafted from cutting-edge science, its unique molecular structure means that while providing armoured protection against crude concrete and even barbed wire, it remains light enough to allow you to run at high speed. It sounds like the stuff of Batman comics - but the superhero suit is here.

Identified as a major breakthrough that could impact on every sector from the military to motor sports, the revolutionary shock-absorbent material d3o is taking the world by storm. Blessed with the kind of properties your average costumed crime fighter would kill for, it is being hailed as an invention with the potential to change entire industries and save real lives.

In a nutshell, d3o is an advanced polymer with an intelligent molecular structure that flows with you as you move but, when shocked, locks together to become rigid enough to absorb impact energy. In its simplest form, it is like an automatic knee-pad that can be sown seamlessly into a pair of jeans."

At the moment a complete superhero suit made of our material would be a bit too heavy and far too expensive, but those challenges should be overcome within the next few years."

Today the material is fast becoming a common component of cutting-edge protective equipment, with the d3o brand beginning to feature in a range of winter and motor sports products worldwide. It has been adopted enthusiastically by the likes of US Olympic ski team, the four-times Everest climber Kenton Cool and Olympic cyclist Craig McClean.

Source: Spluch

"Kill Proof," Animal-Esque Soldiers: DARPA Goal

DARPA, the Pentagon's way-out science arm wants to make soldiers stronger, faster, and generally "kill proof." The key, the agency believes: Getting humans to act more like animals.

For years, DARPA has been pushing to boost soldier performance. Today, at the opening of DARPATech, the agency's bi-annual conference, program manager Michael Callahan just announced a new effort to take that research even further. He calls it "Inner Armor."

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Pentagon Studies Human Microchip Implants

The Defense Department's plans to study implanting microchips in soldiers is already sparking concerns about privacy issues (and is likely to send the stock price of tinfoil to new highs).

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'Field Sense' May Be Teachable

The likes of Wayne Gretzky, Michael Jordan, and Diego Maradona, besides their athletic ability, have an incredible sense of the players around them, which allowed them to display incredible plays in their respective sports.

Peter Vint is a researcher at the US Olympic Committee, and showed Wired his research on how great players quickly adapt to their environments and how this can be taught to others.

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Researchers use gene therapy to restore sight in mice

University of Florida researchers used gene therapy to restore sight in mice with a form of hereditary blindness, a finding that has bearing on many of the most common blinding diseases.

Writing in Nature Medicine, scientists describe how they used a harmless virus to deliver corrective genes to mice with a genetic impairment that robs them of vision.

The discovery shows that it is possible to target and rescue cone cells - the most important cells for visual sharpness and color vision in people.

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Backlash against RFID is growing

Civil rights and privacy rights groups have opposed radio frequency identification, or RFID, for years. But now, researchers in the field and some lawmakers are beginning to voice concerns about the security of the technology.

In the past year, twenty-two states have introduced legislation regarding RFID technology, which uses tiny radio transmitter chips, or "tags," that can be inserted in a pallet full of goods, a pair of jeans, or a passport.

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New Book: Five minds for the future

We live in a time of accelerating globalisation, mounting information, growing hegemony of science and technology and clash of civilisations. Our time calls for new ways of learning and thinking in school, business and professions.

To know how psychologist Howard Gardner defines the cognitive abilities that will command a premium in future, read on. . .

Using technology to enhance humans

It's a well-known fact that technology can improve our lives. For example, we can reach anyone and anywhere with our cellphones. And people who can't walk after an accident now can have smart prosthesis to help them. But what about designing our children on a computer or having a chip inside our brain to answer our email messages? Are we ready for such a future?

In "Robo-quandary," the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel reports that many researchers are working on the subject. And as a professor of neuroscience said, "We can grow neurons on silicone plates; we can make the blind see; the deaf hear; we can read minds." So will all we become cyborgs one day?

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Propellers for Microrobots

Researchers have developed a novel form of propulsion for microrobots that mimics the way bacteria zip about using corkscrew-like appendages called flagella.

Tests show that the tiny rotating nanocoils--just 27 nanometers thick and 40 micrometers long--are capable of spinning at 60 revolutions per minute and that it is possible to propel an object at nearly 5 micrometers per second.

Such propulsion could be used as part of smart drug delivery systems, which are steered through the bloodstream directly to their target, says Bradley Nelson, a professor of robotics and intelligent systems at the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology, in Zurich, who led the research. And in the long term, the nanopropellers could be used to propel autonomous biomedical microrobots, he suggests.

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New RTO Document Available: Human Factors and Medical Aspects....

New RTO Document Available:

Human Factors and Medical Aspects of Day/Night All Weather Operations: Current Issues and Future Challenges