What are Dilithium Crystals

Finally, the Star Trek writers added one more crucial component to the matter-antimatter drive. I refer to the famous dilithium crystals (coincidentally invented by the Star Trek writers long before the Fer-milab engineers decided upon a lithium target in their Antiproton Source).

...What do these remarkable figments of the Star Trek writers' imaginations do? These crystals (known also by their longer formula 26 dilithium 21 diallosilicate 1:9:1 heptoferranide) can regulate the matter-antimatter annihilation rate, because they are claimed to be the only form of matter known which is “porous” to antimatter.

I liberally interpret this as follows: Crystals are atoms regularly arrayed in a lattice; I assume therefore that the antihydrogen atoms are threaded through the lattices of the dilithium crystals and therefore remain a fixed distance both from atoms of normal matter and one another. In this way, dilithium could regulate the antimatter density, and thus the matter-antimatter reaction rate.

Notes:

The molecular composition and purpose of the Star Trek invention in space travel.

Folksonomies: science fiction space travel

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Concepts:
Matter (0.985148): dbpedia | freebase | opencyc
Antimatter (0.934886): dbpedia | freebase
Antihydrogen (0.912416): dbpedia | freebase | yago
Atom (0.873815): dbpedia | freebase | opencyc
Chemistry (0.686472): dbpedia | freebase | opencyc
Nuclear fusion (0.641983): dbpedia | freebase
Star Trek (0.633213): website | dbpedia | freebase | yago
Antiproton (0.606165): dbpedia | freebase

 The Physics of Star Trek
Books, Brochures, and Chapters>Book:  Hawking , Stephen and Krauss, Lawrence (2007-07-10), The Physics of Star Trek, Basic Books (AZ), Retrieved on 2012-03-22
  • Source Material [books.google.com]
  • Folksonomies: games