E-books used to get lumped in with the same science-fiction stuff as jetpacks and lunar colonies.

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Other inventors have used the space to churn out working jetpacks, nanosatellites and remote-control submersibles.

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Jetpacks have become something of a pop-culture meme in the past decade, a hipster shorthand for science fiction's unfulfilled promises.

WSJ: Jetlev R200 Jetpack: Personal Flight, Beyond Bond

You can have it all as a super human space marine - jetpacks, armor, hammers, swords, guns, bombs - in melee, ranged and aerial combat modes.

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There are actually brave souls around the world who build and fly their own jetpacks, most notably Yves Rossy, a Swiss pilot who created a flying wing powered by four small turbofan engines.

WSJ: Jetlev R200 Jetpack: Personal Flight, Beyond Bond

While there's more experiments and development to go before we ever see a tractor beam at the hospital, the achievement brings us one step closer to the sci-fi future we were always told we'd get, right alongside the personal communicators and jetpacks.

ENGADGET: Researchers build a working tractor beam, on a very small scale