MIT developing “Second Skin” spacesuit. Make mine ‘Mass Effect’

Can I get a fuck yeah? Forget those giant, clunky goddamn space-suits that have come to dominate interplanteary iconography. I demand tight, sleek space-suits that make me feel like I’m running around in Mass Effect. MIT got me. Got me good.

Boing Boing:

MIT researchers are developing a “second skin” space suit lined with tiny coils that contract when switched on, tightening the garment around the body. The coils (image below) in the “BioSuit” are made from shape-memory alloy that “remembers” its shape when bent and returns to its original form if heated.

“With conventional spacesuits, you’re essentially in a balloon of gas that’s providing you with the necessary one-third of an atmosphere [of pressure,] to keep you alive in the vacuum of space,” says Dava Newman, MIT professor of aeronautics and astronautics and engineering . “We want to achieve that same pressurization, but through mechanical counterpressure — applying the pressure directly to the skin, thus avoiding the gas pressure altogether. We combine passive elastics with active materials. … Ultimately, the big advantage is mobility, and a very lightweight suit for planetary exploration.”

Looks goddamn sweet to me. I mean, I don’t know what I’m looking at exactly. But I like it.