The Sarcos/Raytheon XOS Exoskeleton suit you see above allows soldiers to lift 90 kg (200 lb) with little or no effort. The updated XOS 2 model features more fluid movement, increase in power output and decrease in power consumption. We’ve rounded up five more cool military technologies you won’t believe exist now. Continue reading to see them all.

5. CornerShot

CornerShot is a weapon accessory invented by Lt. Col. Amos Golan of the Israeli Defense Forces in cooperation with American investors. It was designed in the early 2000s for SWAT teams and special forces in hostile situations usually involving terrorists and hostages. Its purpose is similar to that of the periscope rifle; it allows its operator to both see and attack an armed target, without exposing the operator to counterattack.

4. Million Rounds Per Minute Weapon

Metal Storm has created a 36-barreled stacked projectile machine gun, boasting the highest rate of fire in the world. The prototype weapon demonstrated a firing rate of just over 1 million rounds per minute for a 180-round burst, with a claimed maximum rate of fire of 1.62 million RPM (i.e., 45,000 RPM for each barrel).

3. Dragon Skin

Dragon Skin is a type of ballistic vest made by Pinnacle Armor. It is currently produced in Fresno, California. Its characteristic two-inch-wide circular discs overlap like scale armor, creating a flexible vest that allows a good range of motion and is intended to absorb a high number of hits compared with other military body armor. The discs are composed of silicon carbide ceramic matrices and laminates, much like the larger ceramic plates in other types of bullet resistant vests.

2. Mach 7 Railgun

In the late 2000s, the U.S. Navy tested a railgun that accelerates a 3.2 kg (7 pound) projectile to hypersonic velocities of approximately 2.4 kilometres per second (5,400 mph), about Mach 7. The U.S. Navy plans to integrate a railgun that has a range of over 160 km (100 mi) onto a ship by 2016.[38] By that time the Navy expects to have a weapon that can fire multiple projectiles per minute. The hyper-velocity rounds weigh 10 kg (23 lb) and cost about $25,000 each.

1. Invisibility Cloak

Optical metamaterials have featured in several recent proposals for invisibility schemes. “Metamaterials” refers to materials that owe their refractive properties to the way they are structured, rather than the substances that compose them. Using transformation optics it is possible to design the optical parameters of a “cloak” so that it guides light around some region, rendering it invisible over a certain band of wavelengths. These spatially varying optical parameters do not correspond to any natural material, but may be implemented using metamaterials. There are several theories of cloaking, giving rise to different types of invisibility.

Author

A technology, gadget and video game enthusiast that loves covering the latest industry news. Favorite trade show? Mobile World Congress in Barcelona.