Not since RoboCop has being a cyborg seemed so very cool. University of Chicago geoscientists are developing an artificial intelligence system that future Mars explorers could incorporate into their spacesuits to help them recognize signs of life on Mars' barren surface.

The systems would entail an AI system known as a Hopfield neural network that uses processes closely mimicking human thought to weigh evidence and make decisions based on previously known facts and patterns. Using digital eyes incorporated into astronauts' suits, the AI system would collect data from the environment and analyze it in the Hopfield networks located on the hips of the suits.

Preloaded data as well as data collected as the astronauts go about their Martian surface walks would be turned over in the AI systems much in the same way a human brain would crunch it. For instance, the Hopfield's algorithm can learn colors from a single image, then relate it to previously observed instances of that color, making connections between the two. Recent tests of a complete, wearable prototype sui