Gentlemen, we can rebuild him, after all. We have the technology.
The term bionic man was the stuff of science fiction in the 1970s, when a popular TV show called The Six Million Dollar Man chronicled the adventures of Steve Austin, a former astronaut whose body was rebuilt using artificial parts after he nearly died.
Now, a team of engineers have assembled a robot using artificial organs, limbs and other body parts that comes tantalisingly close to a true bionic man. For real, this time.
The artificial man is the subject of a Smithsonian Channel documentary called The Incredible Bionic Man.
It chronicles engineers' attempt to assemble a functioning body using artificial parts that range from a working kidney and circulation system to cochlear and retina implants.
The parts hail from 17 manufacturers around the world. This is the first time they've been assembled together, says Richard Walker, managing director of the Shadow Robot Company and the lead roboticist on the project.
"(It's) an attempt to showcase just how far medical science has gotten," he says.
The robot is appearing in the US for the first time this week.
Walker says the robot has about 60 to 70 per cent of the function of a human.
It stands six-and-a-half feet tall and can step, sit and stand with the help of a Rex walking machine that's used by people who've lost the ability to walk due to a spinal injury.
It also has a functioning heart that, using an electronic pump, beats and circulates artificial blood, which carries oxygen just like human blood.
An artificial, implantable kidney, meanwhile, replaces the function of a modern-day dialysis unit.
Although the parts used in the robot work, many of them are a long way from being used in humans.
The kidney, for example, is only a prototype. And there are some key parts missing: there's no digestive system, liver, or skin. And, of course, no brain.
And the cost? As it turns out, this bionic man comes cheaper than his six-million-dollar sci-fi cousin.
While the parts used in the experiment were donated, their value is about $US1 million ($A1.06 million).
