Red Dwarf's six greatest technologies

Find your nearest red-alert bulb and get flashing: Red Dwarf triumphantly returns to British TV this week -- coming out of stasis for the first new episodes in ten years.

To celebrate, we've cleared the smeg out of our brains and thought back over two decades of Dwarfing, to bring you a collection of the greatest gadgets and top technologies from the Red Dwarf universe. And what's more, we'll show you just how far we have to go by comparing their real-world counterparts in use today.

#1: The DNA Modifier

The Cat accidentally once turned Lister into a chicken using a DNA modifier, before being turned into a hamster. This remarkable machine could turn any living thing into any other by rewriting its DNA.

Real life: The ability to transform your friends into poultry may, to most, seem but a dream. And indeed, turning criminals into food for the hungry seems like a smashing way to combat crime, global famine and overpopulation in one fell swoop. But today, the closest we can get is genetically modified food, and the cloning of sundry mammals.

Small steps, though, and before you know it -- bam! -- it'll be three million years in the future, and domestic arguments are solved by turning loved ones into livestock. Happy times await.

#2: Artificial Reality

The insanely popular AR game Better Than Life proved horribly addictive to the Red Dwarf crew. Legion's Cyber Park also allowed visitors to his complex to "indulge in any fantasy they wish, with any persons they desire." Unsurprisingly, sex with celebrities was a popular choice.

Real life: In real life we're given fewer options: if you want to sleep with a famous person, you need to ask one nicely, or become one and ask your partner what it's like. But emotive and deeply involving online games are not hard to come by.

True, the closest to doing the dirty with a sleb in World of Warcraft is plunging your Claymore of Ancient Power into a level 70 orc. But give it a few hundred years and you'll be virtually bedding your dream A-lister (pun sort of intended) before you can say 'perverted'.

Next: Something to do with feet and convicts...