“Our Field’s metal-epoxy composite can become as flexible as latex rubber or as stiff as hard acrylic, over 1,000 times more rigid, just by heating it up or cooling it down,” lead author Trevor Buckner said. “Long fibers of this material can be sewn onto a fabric to give it a supportive skeleton that we can turn on and off.”

In addition, the team developed a liquid-based sensor to detect changes, either with the wearer or in the surrounding environment, that can be literally painted onto the fabric. They also embedded specially-formed shape-memory alloy wires — which bend themselves into preprogrammed shapes when exposed to current — throughout the material, enabling it to take and hold its proper form. Imagine a pair of smart pants that can help the elderly stand or sit with ease from even the deepest of couch cushions.

Well, the material probably won’t be used for smart pants because the research was funded by the Air Force Office of Science Research which hopes to use the stuff in everything from wearable tourniquets and smart cargo netting to self-deploying tents.

There are no restrictions on use with personal devices, but officials have encouraged personnel and their kids to uninstall the app.

The Air Force and Coast Guard didn’t provide specific reasoning for the ban, but it’s likely to be consistent with earlier bans. There’s been concerns that TikTok’s ownership might leave it susceptible to pressure from the Chinese government to hand over sensitive data, although the company recently said that China didn’t request any info in the first half of 2019.

And like spokeswoman Maj. Malinda Singleton told the WSJ, some of the issues are “not unique” to any one social media platform. Hostile governments could theoretically recruit people through social networks, and there’s a chance that personnel could inadvertently reveal military secrets or expose themselves to attack. Warnings like this are rare (the Defense Department cautioned against using Pokémon Go in 2016), but they’re not shocking given the potential for oversharing.

The spacecraft completed “all mission objectives,” according to USAF Rapid Capabilities Office director Randy Walden. Just what those are isn’t clear, though. X-37B payloads are still classified, and officials have typically provided only vague hints of what was aboard. One was a thermal spreader that helped test “experimental electronics” and heat pipe cooling in long-term spaceflight, while another project may have tested a Hall-effect ion thruster. Walden did acknowledge that the space plane deployed “small satellites.”

This definitely isn’t the end for the X-37B when a sixth flight is due to take off from Cape Canaveral in 2020. It does, however, raise the bar for future trips. If the USAF is going to continue bragging about long durations in orbit, it will have to fly the space plane for substantially more than two years — that appears feasible, but it’s considerably more challenging than it was this time around.

The firm also pointed to other criteria that it thought should have put it out front, including its ability to lower costs and offer vehicles that are “commercially viable.” Rivals, SpaceX argued, would have to “rely exclusively” on government contracts and thus drain taxpayer money. ULA was even going to rely on Russian rocket motors, defeating the government’s goal of reducing dependence on Russian hardware. SpaceX further noted that Blue Origin and Northrop delayed their development schedules soon after winning their contracts, negating promises they made when they were vying for the Air Force’s money.

On top of this, SpaceX said that it tried to dispute the awards through a neutral resolution process, but that the Air Force refused and provided only a vague, summarized rejection of the company’s arguments. On top of this, the lawsuit accused officials of switching the criteria for the contract without giving SpaceX or others to respond.

If successful, the lawsuit would require the Air Force to halt investment, reevaluate the offers and potentially “make a new award decision” based on new terms.

In a statement, a SpaceX spokesperson told Engadget the company was fine with the Air Force continuing with the second phase of its rocket procurement process “as currently planned,” but “respecfully disagrees” with the initial choice. The private spaceflight outfit was filing the lawsuit to “ensure a level playing field for competition,” according to the spokesperson.

It’s difficult to say if SpaceX’s suit will succeed. While the lawsuit shows some reasons to believe SpaceX was the victim of an unfair process, critics might characterize the lawsuit as sour grapes — it’s mad that it lost out and wants to prevent its competitors from gaining the upper hand. The Air Force isn’t likely to be receptive given that it already tossed out SpaceX’s earlier pleas. Whoever’s telling the truth, you can be sure that SpaceX will fight hard. Government contracts are a large part of its business, and losing even some of them could significantly hurt its bottom line.

You won’t see the technology used in-air for a while. The USAF only gave Lockheed Martin a contract in 2017, and the first airborne tests aren’t expected until sometime in 2021. It would likely take a while after that before the system could find its way into service.

Provided the technology works as promised, though, it could have a dramatic effect on combat aircraft. The laser wouldn’t be an offensive weapon, at least not at first. Rather, it would be used to shoot down missiles (both air-to-air and surface-to-air). As long as nothing interfered with the laser, an aircraft could be virtually impervious to missile attacks and effectively control the skies.