December 2, 2018
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Pentagon looks to exoskeleton to build 'super-soldiers'
The U.S. Army has awarded a $6.9m contract to develop an 'Iron Man' exoskeleton to give soldiers superhuman strength and endurance.
Called Onyx, the battery-operated exoskeleton uses a suite of sensors, artificial intelligence and other technology to aid natural movements. It is being built by Lockheed Martin, and was originally designed to help people with mobility problems.
Lockheed Martin said: 'It supports and boosts leg capacity for physically demanding tasks that require lifting or dragging heavy loads, holding tools or equipment, repetitive or continuous kneeling or squatting, crawling, walking long distances, walking with load, walking up or down hills, or carrying loads on stairs. When human strength is challenged, ONYX makes the difference, reducing muscle fatigue, increasing endurance, and reducing injury.'
For the U.S. military, the appeal of such technology is clear: Soldiers now deploy into war zones bogged down by heavy but critical gear like body armor, night-vision goggles and advanced radios. Altogether, that can weigh anywhere from 90 to 40-64 kg, when the recommended limit is just 50 pounds 23 kg.
'That means when people do show up to the fight, they're fatigued. The fundamental challenge we're facing with infantry troops is they're carrying too much weight,' said Paul Scharre at the Center for a New American Security, who helped lead a series of studies on exoskeletons and other advanced gear.
The $6.9 million award from the U.S. Army Natick Soldier Research, Development and Engineering Center is to research and develop the exoskeleton, called ONYX, under a two-year, sole-source agreement.
Keith Maxwell, the exoskeleton technologies manager at Lockheed Martin Missiles and Fire Control, said people in his company's trials who wore the exoskeletons showed far more endurance. 'You get to the fight fresh. You're not worn out,' Maxwell said.
Maxwell, who demonstrated a prototype, said each exoskelelton was expected to cost in the tens of thousands of dollars. Early tests of a previous version showed that the exoskeleton has increased productivity anywhere from two to 27 times.
The United States is not the only country looking at exoskeleton technology.
B-TEMIA's medically focused system, called Keeogo, is sold in Canada for about C$39,000 ($30,000), company spokeswoman Pamela Borges said.
Samuel Bendett at the Center for Naval Analyses (CNAS), a federally funded U.S. research and development center, said Russia and China were also investing in exoskeleton technologies, 'in parallel' to the U.S. advances. Russia, in particular, was working on several versions of exoskeletons, including one that it tested recently in Syria, Bendett said.
The CNAS analysis of the exoskeleton was part of a larger look by the Washington-based think tank at next-generation technologies that can aid soldiers, from better helmets to shield them from blast injuries to the introduction of robotic 'teammates' to help resupply them in war zones.
Extracted from: www.dailymail.co.uk
