As we crack open fresh calendars for a new year, we’re treated to a predictable rash of blog posts: 2009 technology predictions. I’ve read a number of these, and prognostications about Microsoft buying Yahoo make me want to light my laptop on fire just to cure the boredom. As an anecdote to lame, ‘what’s the next Twitter?’-style tech prediction lists, I’ve decided to make a list 2009 tech predictions entirely inspired by movies.

2008 was the year in which widely available real-world gadgets were just as good as what James Bond had. Sure, Daniel Craig kicked some ass in Quantum of Solace, but his only real piece of tech was a phone with a camera and GPS! (Hope you got a good texting plan with that, James.) I predict this trend will continue in 2009. We’ll see even more real-world gadgets that used to be the sole domain of Hollywood special effects gurus. Sure, some of these technologies will require minor miracles to become a reality in the coming year, but others are closer than you think.

Strength-Enhancing Exoskeleton Armor

In Iron Man, Tony Stark creates a crude, internally-powered suit of armor to escape his terrorist captors. Once he’s safely at home in his billion-dollar laboratory, he hones the suit into a golden ass-kicking machine, and becomes Iron Man. This story isn’t that far from the truth. Rather than a single billionaire playboy, teams of research scientists are developing robotic suits that significantly increase the wearer’s strength. And the end goal is goal is the same: beating the hell out of terrorists. Almost five years ago, UC Berkley researchers announced a DARPA-funded project called BLEEX, the Berkley Lower Extremity Exoskeleton (pictured at left). If you’re thinking that giant backpack is full of the machinery that runs the thing, you’re wrong. That’s the 70 lbs. pack the wearer can hardly feel, thanks to his robot legs. Assuming secret military technology is always ahead of publicized military technology, and considering that the BLEEX is five years old, I think it’s safe to say that in 2009 President Obama will personally don an Iron Man suit and kill Osama bin Laden.

Levitation

Levitation in movies is usually some sort of magical or paranormal phenomenon, like Yoda using the force to lift Luke Skywalker’s X-Wing out of the swamp. But there are examples of technological levitation in fiction, especially flying saucers and other craft that can stay aloft without forward momentum. A technological version of the Force is still a long way off, but there are plenty of forms of levitation that are quite common. Magnetism can be easily harnessed to levitate certain objects, and just last week, scientists added another method to the growing list of levitation technologies. Harvard physicist Federico Capasso has effectively reversed the Casimir effect, which causes metal objects to become attracted to one another when they’re very close together. As exciting as this sounds, the reversal only works on extremely small pieces of metal. But it’s still a step in the right direction.

Invisibility

Harry Potter’s invisibility cloak relies on magic rather than technology, but this hasn’t stopped scientists from trying to replicate its effects. While one would hope that researchers’ interest in invisibility technology goes beyond their fondness for the boy wizard, they invariably mention Potter’s cloak in every news story about advances in invisibility technology. The development of meta-materials that can redirect lightwaves around an object have made steady progress in recent years. In a National Geographic article from November of last year, researcher Ulf Leonhardt claimed that invisibility cloaks are now “feasible.” Of course there are a few catches. The phenomenon alters visible light slightly while it bends it, and it can only work with specific shapes, meaning that a coat of invisible paint on a spy plane or a stylish cape are still out of reach. With the release of Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince in July of this year, I’m sure Potter-loving invisibility scientists will pursue their study with renewed fervor.

X-Ray Vision

The most popular depiction of x-ray vision is of course Superman, but the Man of Steel doesn’t need a gadget to see Louis Lane’s underwear. There are examples of technological x-ray vision in movies, like the all-but-forgotten 1996 Schwarzenegger vehicle, Eraser. The film featured an advanced weapon called a rail-gun, which had a scope that could see through solid objects. X-ray vision, like levitation, has existed in certain forms for long time, but making it as practical as Superman’s vision is another matter. Thermal imaging goggles used by police and military can see through certain objects that block visual light because of their ability to see infrared light. A new technology being employed in security situations is terahertz imagery, which can see through fabrics and plastic. While the mail-order x-ray specs sold out of comic books in the ’60s were a sham, back in 1998 Sony sold thousands of consumer video cameras whose “night shot” feature allowed users to see through clothing, especially swim wear.

Time Travel

Debating the physical and philosophical effects of time travel is a favorite passtime of sci-fi buffs and people who edit Wikipedia entries. The scientific consensus is that Back to the Future-style DeLorean time travel is not possible, but Einstein’s theories of general and special relativity do allow for certain types of time travel. For example, the phenomenon of time dilation allows for something akin to traveling into the future. If there were twins, and one stayed on Earth while the other went on a long trip on a spaceship at nearly the speed of light, the traveling twin would be younger when he returned. From his perspective, his trip lasted one year, while his twin would insist that he’d been gone for ten years. So this means that the DeLorean would have to travel much faster than 88 miles per hour, and once they traveled to the future, they could never go back.

There is another theoretically possible form of time travel, which involves constructing an infinitely long cylinder in space and rotating it on its longitudinal axis. This would bend space time around the cylinder, allowing a spacecraft to essentially fly back in time. But since there are no infinitely long cylinders laying around, time travel in 2009 seems unlikely. Unless a time traveler from the future decides to come back to 2009 and share his knowledge with us. He’d probably kill his own grandfather, too, just to mess with our heads.