If radars wore pants, a lot of them would still be sporting bell-bottoms.

Significant aspects of radar haven’t fundamentally changed since the 1970s, said Kurt Sorensen, a senior manager who oversees the development of high-performance radio frequency imaging technologies at Sandia National Laboratories. Like a record player, most military-grade systems are still analog.

Now, Sandia is giving radar a major digital makeover. Researchers are working to replace legacy analog radars commonly used by the military with a new, digital, software-defined system called Multi-Mission Radio Frequency Architecture. The overhauled design promises U.S. warfighters unprecedented flexibility and performance during intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance operations, even against sophisticated adversaries.

An Israeli military technology startup called Camero-Tech has unveiled a radar-based device that it claims allows soldiers to literally “see through walls,” Insider reports, raising significant questions about surveillance and privacy.

The Xaver 1,000 is a futuristic gadget that can give intelligence units “an unprecedented situational awareness 3D visual picture,” according to the company’s website, and has the ability to detect “live objects (static or dynamic) behind walls and building obstacles.”

That means tactical teams could soon get a highly detailed picture of what’s going on behind a variety of obstructions, allowing them to prepare ahead of breaching urban environments.

Lauded for its compelling action sequences and exhilarating portrayal of next-gen aerial dogfighting, Top Gun: Maverick has quickly become a monumental success at the box office. But the producers couldn’t have done it without leveraging the expertise of some of the world’s foremost experts in all things aerospace, and that includes tapping into the minds of Lockheed Martin Skunk Works engineers to craft their physics-bending Darkstar hypersonic jet.

Without wanting to give away any of the plot’s specifics, the Darkstar aircraft features early in the film as Pete “Maverick” Mitchell (played by Tom Cruise) carries out his duties as a test pilot for the US Navy. The futuristic fighter jet is a jaw-dropping introduction to the hyperreal aesthetics of the film, but may also strike a familiar chord with aviation enthusiasts due to a likeness to one of history’s most revered aerial vehicles, the SR-71 Blackbird.

When looking for some expert assistance in creating the Darkstar aircraft, the film’s producers were pointed in the direction of Lockheed Martin’s Skunk Works division, responsible for the SR-71, its forthcoming successor the SR-72 and the U-2 spy plane. This collaboration created a new outlet for expression for Skunk Works clandestine conceptual designers, in the sense that this particular aircraft design was one they could share with the world – as conceptual designer “Jim” explains in this video.