8 Science Experiments Inspired By Superheroes

4. Captain America - Super Soldiers

Captain America started out as a puny human, and science turned him into a supersoldier - a very attractive idea for the people who make their careers in war.

Whilst they don't come straight out and say that they're looking to create dishy, patriotic supersoldiers, DARPA's 2013 budget did set aside $44.5 million to develop “biological systems that cross multiple scales of biological architecture and function, from the molecular and genetic level.” They were also looking into the field of Optogenetics, which involves the manipulation of neural activity to essentially control behaviour.

There are also ways to physically enhance soldiers without ticking about in their genomes, such as high-altitude training, but the general idea is to make them better, faster and stronger from the inside out.

So, rather than just arming them to the teeth, the US military are at least thinking about altering the soldiers themselves. Sounds pretty Captain America to us.