One of the cool uses of robotic technology is to make wearable exoskeletons for human use and enhancement.

A professor at Tsukuba University in Japan has done just that: made an exoskeleton called HAL that supplements the wearer's natural body strength. Bottom line? Wear HAL and you can pick up twice the weight of a normal person, walk twice as far ... maybe even fight twice as hard.

Anyway, the usage the inventor in Japan has in mind is a little more benign than creating ultimate warriors or tireless workers (although those things might come too). Right now, it's being looked at as a way to help older people and paralytics walk again.

Here's an article about a guy they have testing it who is paralyzed from the neck down, but with HAL is planning to scale a mountain peak: http://www.theage.com.au/news/breaking/robot-suit-will-help-quadriplegic-scale-the-heights/2006/04/04/1143916503382.html

And here's the official website for the professor's university page: http://sanlab.kz.tsukuba.ac.jp/indexE.html

The Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency is Japan's version of NASA. I recently got to go to a meeting in Tokyo in which they announced they were developing a new next-generation Supersonic Jetliner to provide commercial service between Japan and the US.

I asked the president of JAXA (Tachikawa-san) why he thought Japan would be able to make a commercially viable supersonic jetliner when British Airways and Air France had both cancelled their entirely due to never making it profitable. (Russia also had a brief failure Concordski).

Tachikawa replied without hesitation: "Because our supersonic airplane is entirely different than theirs. It's a completely different engine design, as different from conventional jet engines as the Toyota Prius Hybrid is from conventional automobiles." And in fact, the first tests have shown that the new Japanese supersonic jetliner is faster, quieter, far more fuel efficient, pollutes less, and carries more passengers than any of the now defunct first-generation Concordes did.

It may be a while before it's commercially available. (Maybe 2015 or so.) But man, what a difference it would make. I have to fly every month back and forth between San Francisco and Tokyo (economy class). I would love to get there in two hours instead of eleven.

More information here: http://www.ista.jaxa.jp/res/a01/0a00.html