Science Fiction Dictionary
A  B  C  D  E  F  G  H  I  J  K  L  M  N  O  P  Q  R  S  T  U  V  W  X  Y  Z

Latest By
Category:


Armor
Artificial Intelligence
Biology
Clothing
Communication
Computers
Culture
Data Storage
Displays
Engineering
Entertainment
Food
Input Devices
Lifestyle
Living Space
Manufacturing
Material
Media
Medical
Miscellaneous
Robotics
Security
Space Tech
Spacecraft
Surveillance
Transportation
Travel
Vehicle
Virtual Person
Warfare
Weapon
Work

"I myself feel that our country, for whose Constitution I fought in a just war, might as well have been invaded by Martians and body snatchers."
- Kurt Vonnegut, Jr.

AM-280 Needle Rifle  
  Device shoots a stream of steel needles.  

Very handy when fighting alien caterpillars the size of buses.

"The rifle was an AM-280 with tunable laser sight. The output was set high in the UV and I had to wear an EV-helmet with retinal-focused eyepieces to see the beam. It spat high-velocity bursts of eighteen-grain needles, as many as three thousand per minute. You pointed the beam at your target and pulled the trigger. The needle burst would tear holes in a steel door. They said you could slice a man in half with a 280. I didn’t want to try."
Technovelgy from A Matter For Men, by David Gerrold.
Published by Simon and Schuster in 1983
Additional resources -

This is probably a deliberate upgrade to a weapon like this one - the AM-180.

Speaking of giant alien caterpillars, I ran across this creature in a 1963 edition of Amazing Stories:


(QUINQUEPEDALIAN by Piers Anthony)

Thanks to Odon for the quote and the video.

Comment/Join this discussion ( 0 ) | RSS/XML | Blog This |

Additional resources:
  More Ideas and Technology from A Matter For Men
  More Ideas and Technology by David Gerrold
  Tech news articles related to A Matter For Men
  Tech news articles related to works by David Gerrold

Articles related to Weapon
Worm Disrupts Physics Simulations Undetected For A Decade
Moscow Attacked By Hundreds Of Drones
China's Handheld Electromagnetic Gun
Is The Seattle Ultrasonics C-200 A Heinlein Vibroblade?

Want to Contribute an Item? It's easy:
Get the name of the item, a quote, the book's name and the author's name, and Add it here.

<Previous
Next>

Google
  Web TechNovelgy.com   

 

 

Technovelgy (that's tech-novel-gee!) is devoted to the creative science inventions and ideas of sf authors. Look for the Invention Category that interests you, the Glossary, the Science Fiction Invention Timeline, or see what's New.

 

 

 

 

Science Fiction Timeline
1600-1899
1900-1939
1940's   1950's
1960's   1970's
1980's   1990's
2000's   2010's

Science Fiction in the News

I Need An Outdoor Spherical Displays
'Usually a spherical display hovered in the centre...'

Worm Disrupts Physics Simulations Undetected For A Decade
'It diverts integers of the data, the fundamental message-units, so that they no longer agree.'

Muxcard Redditor's DIY Credit Card-Sized Computer
It's a computer, but just barely.

'Soft Assembly' Fashions That Fashion Themselves On The Wearer
'Clothes are no longer made from dead fibers of fixed color and texture that can approximate only crudely to the vagrant human figure...'

Orwell's Nightmare Of AI-Written Novels Comes To Pass
'Books were just a commodity that had to be produced, like jam or bootlaces.'

ISS Plagued By Leak - Again!
'There were perhaps a dozen bladder-like objects in the tunnel...'

Ridiculous 'Ghost Murmur' Tech Still Science Fiction
'...it rears and spreads its fan. It can pick one man out of a crowd.'

Infrared Contact Lenses To See In The Dark
'I can see in the dark, Case.'

What'll You Have? Extinct Animals Returned, Or Synthetic Eggshells?
'...a new plastic with the characteristics of an avian eggshell.'

More SF in the News

More Beyond Technovelgy

Home | Glossary | Science Fiction Timeline | Category | New | Contact Us | FAQ | Advertise |
Technovelgy.com - where science meets fiction™

Copyright© Technovelgy LLC; all rights reserved.