Star Trek Technology
T
Temporal incursion
Canon - Official Star Trek Technology
Method of altering history by erasing
a target object from space-time in a way that it has never existed.
Temporal incursion is equivalent to traveling back in time and removing
or destroying the respective object.
The Krenim scientist Annorax carried out countless incursions in order
to restore the Krenim Imperium (see Time Travel in Voyager).
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Terraforming
Canon - Official Star Trek Technology
Generic term for technologies employed
to convert a desert planet into an inhabitable Class-M world.
In TNG: "Home Soil" the terraforming project had to be stopped
after intelligent life had been detected on the allegedly desert planet.
Still, it is not reasonable why the Federation abandoned the Genesis
project that was far more advanced and powerful than all subsequent
methods.
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Time dilation
Canon - Official Star Trek Technology
General or special relativistic effect that occurs either in the vicinity of a mass concentration (see black hole, event horizon) or at high relative speeds (see relativistic speed), respectively.
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Time travel
Canon - Official Star Trek Technology
Usually any movement through time that is not equivalent to the normal
course of time, in particular a person's travel leading to the past
or faster as usual to the future. Time travel to the past may be connected
with paradoxes or causality loops, if an effect becomes apparent before
the cause exists.
These and other problems of time travel are extensively discussed in
Time Travel - General Considerations. Traveling at relativistic speeds
will allow time travel to the future, however, with no return. A kind
of time travel to the past is evident in the case of two correlated
photons, when one photon immediately changes to a certain state once
the state of the other photon is determined. This is only possible with
an FTL signal transfer or a wave function traveling to the past.
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Timeship
Canon - Official Star Trek Technology
Vessel capable of traveling through
time generating temporal rifts.
The 29th century Federation timeships Aeon (VOY: "Future's End")
and Relativity (VOY: "Relativity") are part of a Federation
institution seeking and preventing manipulations in the timeline.
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Tractor beam
Canon - Official Star Trek Technology
Device used by Federation starships to hold and tow other vessels. Apart from the main emitter and optional auxiliary emitters located around the hull, a small tractor beam emitter is located in each shuttle bay to control the landing procedure. Tractor beams are based on a subspace field assisted emission of gravitons, their direction can be reversed to push away an object.
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Trajector
Canon - Official Star Trek Technology
Transporting device used by the Sikarians with a range of 40,000 light
years.
This device was featured in VOY: "Prime Factors" and was possibly
based on space folding.
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Translocator
Canon - Official Star Trek Technology
Nyrian device to transport objects or persons across distances as
great as 10ly.
Nothing more is known about the device, but it may work similar as the
subspace transporter.
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Transphasic torpedo
Canon - Official Star Trek Technology
A future weapon technology that was
prematurely used by U.S.S. Voyager to defeat the Borg in 2378
It seems that transphasic torpedoes are related to phase cloaks. This
would imply that conventional shields would be useless against them.
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Transporter
Canon - Official Star Trek Technology
Device that is able to dematerialize,
transmit and reassemble an object. Cargo transporters have limited resolution
and are employed for transport of inanimate objects. Personnel transporters
work on the quantum level and employ Heisenberg compensators to enable
secure transport of lifeforms. A transporter room typically consists
of an operator console, a transporter platform and an overhead molecular
imaging scanner, primary energizing coils and phase transition coils.
A pattern buffer with a biofilter is located on the deck below. The
outer hull of a starship incorporates a number of emitter pads for the
transporter beam. A typical transport sequence for the beam-down of
a person begins with a coordinate lock during which the destination
is verified and programmed. Next, the lifeform to be beamed is scanned
on the quantum level and simultaneously converted to a matter stream.
This process is determined by an annular confinement beam (ACB). The
matter stream is briefly stored in the pattern buffer tank and then
transmitted through an emitter pad. Finally, the person is reassembled
at the destination. Transporters cannot be used while the deflector
shields of the ship are active.
The transporter is the most debatable regular device in Star Trek, and
some of its many oddities are discussed on the inconsistencies page.
The fact that transporter patterns are often handled the same way as
computer data, although they are supposed to be a matter stream, is
unfortunately not addressed in the TNG Technical Manual. An explanation
on how a person can be reassembled on an unknown planet is missing as
well. Transport at warp velocities is regarded possible as long as both
starships travel at exactly the same warp factor. Smaller relative motions
can be compensated by a Doppler compensator. While the normal recommended
transportation range is 40,000 km, it can be assumed that under ideal
conditions, in particular if two transporter systems are involved, this
range can be significantly extended. This is what Rick Sternbach wrote
about the transporter in his newsgroup (posted 07.04.99): "The
transporter definitely uses the person's (or object's) own matter and
transmits it over a jacketed beam. While it uses a lot of the same field
manipulation technologies as a replicator, it doesn't replicate the
person (or object). The fact that we've heard people talking in the
transporter beam seems to say that you don't get unzipped in a linear
fashion (like from the top of your head to your toes), but more like
atoms taken from all over, randomly, but with all the quantum state
and position data temporarily recorded for reassembly. It's pretty analogous
to the difference between recording a television broadcast (replicator)
and simply sending out a live broadcast (transporter), because in the
case of the latter, there's just too much data to record, at least with
Federation technology."
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Transtator
Canon - Official Star Trek Technology
Basic device of Federation technologies, especially of communicators.
The intentional analogy to the transistor is undeniable, although the
transtator seems to be something discrete, as opposed to the highly
integrated transistors of our days. In TOS: "A Piece of the Action",
Kirk mentions "the transtator" in a communicator, and in DS9:
"The Siege of AR-558", the engineer asks Ezri Dax to repair
a transtator which is part of the communications array. On the other
hand, in DS9: "Trials and Tribble-ations", the transtator
is apparently a part of the power system because O'Brien removes one
from a panel, which turns off the lights on the deck. But he was mistaken
about the function of the device anyway, so it may not have been actually
a transtator.
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Transwarp
Canon - Official Star Trek Technology
Fundamentally a generic term for technologies that overcome the limitations
of conventional warp drives, in particular an experimental propulsion
principle tested with the U.S.S. Excelsior NX-2000. The experiment failed,
and the Excelsior as well as subsequent ships were equipped with a standard
warp drive.
Transwarp technology is also used by the Borg in TNG: "Descent",
however, it is not known if it is the same principle as in "Star
Trek: The Search for Spock". The Voth are another race using transwarp
(VOY: "Distant Origin").
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Tricobalt device
Canon - Official Star Trek Technology
Explosive device used on the planet
Eminiar VII and later adopted for Federation starships.
Tricobalt devices seem to be rather old-fashioned yet efficient weapons
if they are used against targets with limited or no defense, such as
in TOS: "A Taste of Armageddon" and VOY: "The Caretaker".
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TricorderCanon - Official Star Trek Technology
Hand-held sensing, computing and communication
device for use by Starfleet personnel. The tricorder incorporates sensor
and computer systems in a miniaturized version with limited capabilities,
yet sufficient for away missions.
Considering the ongoing miniaturization of computer as well as sensor
elements, it will soon be feasible to design a fully functional tricorder.
However, it is questionable if there will be a need for such a device,
at least in the near future, for it would be too sophisticated for a
consumer product and not specialized enough for a scientific apparatus.
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Turbolift
Canon - Official Star Trek Technology
Transportation system within a starship.
The turbolift system consists of a network of turboshafts and the single
turbolift cars. A turbolift is driven by linear motors. Acceleration
up to 10m/s^2 is possible and can be partially compensated for the passengers
by damping fields within the car.
The turbolift is a nice example for real world technology adapted for
Star Trek. Linear motors have actually been developed for transportation
purposes, for instance in the German Transrapid (see their homepage).
Fundamentally, such a motor works in a similar way as a conventional
cylindrical electric motor, where a rotor is located inside a stator.
The linear motor has the stator unrolled, and the rotor can be replaced
by a simple magnet in the car that is free to move along the stator
in the roadway. Propulsion is achieved by powering the stator in a way
to generate a traveling field.
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