Time magazine's 50 best inventions of 2008

Save for its omission of the portable fusion generator I'm working on in my garage, Time magazine has done a bang-up job of rounding up the 50 best, most innovative, and most potentially life-changing inventions of the year.

I don't have room to outline the entire top 50 here (and some of the pics are, frankly, questionable), but here are some of the magazine's most interesting and spot-on selections.

41. The Peraves MonoTracer (Picture right) - Even if you don't ride a motorcycle, you've got to love the enclosed design of this two-seater-two-wheeler. Sadly, these designs never seem to come to the U.S.

33. Biomechanical Energy Harvester - Walking around wastes endless energy. Why not capture some of that power to charge gadgets while you're striding? When they build this technology into sneakers it's going to be huge.

24. Bionic Contacts - Bringing you your personal HUD, for real.

14. The Mobile, Dexterous, Social Robot - It's only a matter of time before they start replacing us bloggers.

13. The Memristor - A theoretical electronics component becomes a reality 37 years after it is hypothesized. Could change just about everything about computers over the next 5 to 10 years.

11. Green Crude - Gas from algae. Delicious, nutritious, car-fueling algae.

10. The World's Fastest Computer (Picture right) - Always fun to see these supercomputer cats one-up each other. The Roadrunner broke the petaflop barrier and is now installed at Los Alamos National Laboratory where it plays Tic-Tac-Toe against itself all day long.

5. The Large Hadron Collider - Even if it makes a black hole that destroys the earth, it'll be worth it because it's that cool.

2. The Tesla Roadster - A 125 mph electric car. Definitely want.

1. The Retail DNA Test (Picture right) -  For $399 you can find out what your risks are for developing genetic-based diseases -- and how your hypothetical children might fare, as well. I'm deeply afraid of these tests because I'm already totally paranoid about my health as it is. I badly bruised my foot this week and a little web searching had me convinced it was a life-threatening brown recluse spider bit. Do I really need my genes telling me I have an 80 percent chance of Alzheimer's? Yikes. Still, very cool idea and finally affordable.