U.S. Military Looks to Hollywood for its Ultimate ‘Ironman’ Suit

<p>Marvel is everywhere&comma; including on the world&&num;8217&semi;s real battlefields if Washington has its way&period; The U&period;S&period; government&&num;8217&semi;s latest dream come true&comma; the TALOS &lpar;Tactical Assault Light Operator&rpar; suit&comma; are straight off out of the comics&colon;  bulletproof&comma; weaponized&comma; monitor vitals&comma; and capable of giving its wearer superhuman strength and perception&period; Sound familiar&quest;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>It should&comma; because its being made the Marvel Way&period; To make its Ironman suit of the future&comma; the military&&num;8217&semi;s turned to the private sector for help&period; Among names like Lockheed Martin&comma; General Dynamics&comma; and Raytheon reportedly getting involved&comma; special effects maker Legacy Effects&&num;8211&semi;the brainchild behind the Iron Man suit for Marvel&&num;8217&semi;s feature film&&num;8211&semi;will be aiding the Pentagon with its research into the project&period; The company will help design and 3D print prototypes&comma; according to the Wall Street Journal&comma; and helping on behalf of Ekso Bionics&comma; an exoskeleton creator&comma; and admits that what it&&num;8217&semi;s doing here is a change of pace&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p><strong> &&num;8220&semi;When you&&num;8217&semi;re doing something for a movie it is all make-believe&comma;&&num;8221&semi;<&sol;strong> said Legacy founder Lindsay MacGowan&comma; talking with the Journal&period; <strong>&&num;8220&semi;Whereas&comma; for the military&comma; that&&num;8217&semi;s really not going to be the case&period;&&num;8221&semi;<&sol;strong><&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>Crafting an exoskeleton that can dish out what the military has in mind is the tricky part&comma; and it&&num;8217&semi;s that challenge that&&num;8217&semi;s pushing companies to look towards some unusual fields&period; One group is even studying sumo wrestlers to see just how they throw their own weight around with such agility despite their size&period; Researchers are also studying insects&&num;8217&semi; exoskeletons for their unusual strength given their small body mass&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>The Journal also reports that suit designers expect TALOS to weigh a whopping 400 pounds&period; The Pentagon further believes that 365 pounds of that might need to be batteries <em>just <&sol;em>to power all the onboard support systems the military wants it to have&period; There&&num;8217&semi;s no Energizer bunny to juice any suit that size as of now&&num;8211&semi;that is&comma; without Stark Industries at the helm&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>So far&comma; &dollar;10 million has been reportedly spent on the initiative so far&comma; with no cap to its budget in sight&period; The military is currently looking to deploy the suit as soon as<strong> 2018<&sol;strong>&period; That&&num;8217&semi;s a whole lot sooner than President Jonathan Iron&&num;8217&semi;s <a href&equals;"https&colon;&sol;&sol;bagogames&period;com&sol;call-duty-wages-advanced-warfare-november-4th&sol;">2054 Elysium-ish suits<&sol;a>&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>&nbsp&semi;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>Source&colon; <a href&equals;"http&colon;&sol;&sol;www&period;theverge&period;com&sol;2014&sol;7&sol;7&sol;5878209&sol;military-talos-iron-man-suit-legacy-effects-hollywood-helping">TheVerge<&sol;a><&sol;p>&NewLine;