Extremis Serum

**Extremis** was developed by Aldrich Killian and Maya Hansen in an attempt to recreate the Super Soldier Serum. Extremis rewrites the operating system of the human body, upgrading strength, speed and durability to the very zenith of human possibility. also allows the human body to instantly regenerate damaged tissue, including the immediate regrowth of severed limbs.

## History

The Extremis was a super soldier project developed by a biotech company called FuturePharm, subsidiary of Stark Industries. Alongside Maya Hansen, Dr. Aldrich Killiandeveloped the nanite technology called Microsurgery Experimental Robotics. The project was funded by the U.S. military. However, when the military pulled the plug, Hansen and Killian stole samples and sold them to a terrorist, but a guilt-ridden Killian confessed afterwards in a suicide note.[1]

### Extremis on the loose

In an attempt to regain the stolen serum, Stark as Iron Man was injured battling a domestic terrorist, Mallen, who had been altered by the Extremis drug into a superhuman killing machine. Seeing no other option, he took a modified dose of Extremis to heal his injures and improve his neural interface with the armor and other technologies. The revitalized Iron Man then set out after Mallen.[2] After killing the terrorist without choice, Stark discovered that Maya was the accomplice of Killian in stealing Extremis, and she was put into custody.[3]

Years later, Maya was kidnapped by A.I.M. and forced to duplicate the virus before killing her. The new samples of Extremis were then sold in an auction to four different bidders, whose names were forcibly given to Stark by the head of the auction, Colin Forty-Four, in order to retrieve the Extremis from them by any means necessary.[4]

### Extremis 3.0

The recently-discovered long-lost foster brother of Tony, Arno Stark started working on a new more stable version of Extremis after being contacted by Tony, much to the latter's dismay.[5] When Bruce Banner was shot in the head and suffered brain damage, his neural tissue was fixed with Arno's Extremis.[6] Another application of Extremis, now tweaked by Banner, allowed him to increase the intelligence of the Hulk,[7] unleashing a new personality called "Doc Green."[8]

During World War Hate, a magic spell caused the inversion of Tony Stark's moral axis. The new egocentric and determined Tony Stark released a modified "Extremis 3.0" to San Francisco, giving the people the option of physical perfection for free by way of a wireless application.[9] However, as they found out, this was merely a free trial period, and keeping their "perfect" bodies would require a payment of $99.99 every day.[10] Stark himself appeared to have taken this version of Extremis, allowing him to have close combat abilities capable of taking on and even defeating Daredevil in hand-to-hand combat in terms of strength and reflexes.[11]

Daredevil later discovered the Extremis app wasn't what it appeared to be, Stark had contaminated San Francisco's water supply with the virus, and the Extremis app merely served as a trigger for the Extremis virus to be activated inside a person by generating a certain subsonic frequency. However, Stark prevented Murdock from acting on this discovery by inflicting minor brain damage that would erase Matt's memory of this revelation, also intended to reprogram Extremis to be activated by a signal that Murdock couldn't detect.[12]

## Capabilities

Extremis enhances the user's physiology by rewriting their DNA. It harnessed bio-electricity in the body and used to activate parts of the brain that governed repair and recode it chemically. This can allow a user to hack into basic operating system of living organisms. If the user's body chooses to accept it, the user will gain regenerative healing abilities, making them able to heal all wounds, including previously amputated limbs or even psychological damage. When regenerating body parts, the wounds take on the appearance of burning embers while growing back the lost body part, in a matter of seconds.

and cooling into regular flesh, blood, and bone. Extremis also enhances physical performance, granting superhuman strength, reflexes, and overall higher resilience.

Additionally, normal Extremis users gain the ability to generate extreme amounts of heat through a complex metabolic process, generating heat from their bodies up to several thousand degrees Celsius. Extremis users are able to consciously control the amount of heat expelled from their body, causing the area of their body generating heat to glow intensely, superheating their tissues, blood vessels and nerves, and outlining them inside the body. This effect has been shown to be unstable in the event of an Extremis overload in the body, burning the flesh and causing an explosion. Trained Extremis users can focus and conduct heat through a single area of their body such as their arms or hands, and even emit fire from their mouths, though it would seem that only the most disciplined of Extremis users can perform this feat. Certain users also demonstrated the ability to conduct heat through other objects through physical contact, allowing them to superheat targets by touching them, this being most often used on metal objects to cause them to weaken and melt.

Through a combination of superhuman strength and a focus of extreme heat conduction through their arms and hands, Extremis users can strike through and destroy any metal structures on contact. Due to this, they are able to overpower and burn through the metal alloys that are used in Iron Man armors, easily destroying many of the suits in combat.

* **Superhuman Strength**: An Extremis subject's strength can be increased to superhuman levels, providing the user enough strength to toss cars and people with relative ease,[13] break someone's skull with a single punch,[14] counter Iron Man's superhuman physical blows,[13] break Iron Man's bones with ease through the suit, rip the highly durable suit apart without effort,[13] and even use the "blade" of a bulldozer as a blunt force object.[2]
* **Superhuman Speed**: An Extremis subject can move and run at incredible speeds up to 300mph,[13]although it is unknown if this is the top speed an Extremis subject can move at.
* **Superhuman Stamina**: The serum grants its user unlimited stamina, with no need to eat, drink or breathe air.[13]
* **Superhuman Durability**: Extremis-enhanced beings have greater resistance to physical injury than an ordinary human. They are able to withstand bullet impacts and direct fire of Repulsor Blasts without feeling pain, at a potency higher than which a Repulsor Blast needs to have to cut through metal, only suffering minor wounds.[13] Iron Man's uni-beam only caused Mallen great discomfort without injury.[15]
* **Fire-Breathing**: At the user's discretion, his/her lungs fill with fire plasma which he/she can exhale through his/her mouth. Mallen torched a lobby full of people through this method.[14]
* **Claw-like pincers**: An Extremis subject can unsheathe stings from his/her fingertips. They are very durable, and in conjunction with super-strength, they can be used by the Extremis subject to claw through a converter box.[13]
* **Electrical discharge**: Extremis-enhanced beings are able to discharge extremely powerful electrical currents through his/her hands which seemed to emanate from his chest through his arms.[13]
* **Healing Factor**: Extremis-enhanced beings can also heal wounds at a incredible speed, in a matter of seconds.[15]

## Weaknesses

Extremis users can be easily recognized through thermal imaging as they have a much higher heat signature. They can also be identified as their pupils glow when using their powers. Extremis does not make its users entirely invincible, as wounds like a unibeam shot through the chest will be lethal, destroying the victim's heart and therefore cutting off blood flow to the brain. When the body is regenerating, it is fragile and can be destroyed with a repulsor shot. Destroying their brains and major organs through incineration has been shown to be fatal to them.

The main weakness of Extremis is the possibility that its user's body will reject the serum upon initial injection, or that the serum may become unstable within the user if they fail to regulate their usage of it properly. Extremis users are able to consciously control the amount of heat expelled from their body, but this effect has been shown to be unstable in the event of an Extremis overload in the body and if the virus is not accepted by the body or regulated in it, the metabolic process that causes the user to generate heat, as well as the bio-electricity harnessed by Extremis, will overload, causing the user’s body to rapidly build up energy and force, causing it to explode and produce a powerful shockwave. The resulting explosion is an excess of 3,000°C and instantly vaporizes the Extremis user's body, along with anything within a certain proximity of the explosion, leaving behind shadow-like marks of objects that were vaporized, much like in nuclear explosions. Due to this, Advanced Idea Mechanics had to fake several terrorists' attacks on United States' soil to cover up the explosions caused by Extremis test subjects.