Thoron

A focus of much scrutiny and research, Thoron is a material so far unique to the Gliese 229 system. Among the most important properties of thoron are the inherent link to bluespace and the potential energy capacity. Due to the limited supply and high demand of Thoron, it is currently one of the most valuable materials in human space.

Discovery
In 2490, the Mars Institute of Technology completed initial bugetary planning for an in-depth survey of the Gliese 229 system; thought to lack any resource that would outweigh the costs of exploration and commercialization, thus only interesting in an academic manner. Upon arrival in the Gliese 229 system—in early 2492, a month and a half after it departed MIT—the MITSV Venchenlitte-1 set about its 9 month remass-conservative system survey. About 4 months into the survey, they discovered irregularities in Gliese 229A's companion star, the brown dwarf Gliese 229B, during their survey of the moons and ring systems. The star was discovered to break from the previously defined stellar classification assigned to it, Class "T", reserved for a type of low mass brown dwarf; instead resembling something closer to a heavy gas giant, with abnormal cloud formations and an apparent "ocean" of some liquid deep within. Further investigation lead to both a reclassification of Gliese 229B and the discovery that the dwarf (and its satellites) harbored an unusual substance, dubbed "Thoron," that revolutionized spaceflight forevermore.

Properties
Thoron, as it turned out, existed in a before-unheard-of superposition in what amounted to dwelling in two realities at the same time. Residing both in our universe, and the "parallel" reality dubbed "bluespace" (due to the apparent blue light radiating from all directions), thoron reduced the energy requirements for transitioning between the two planes of existence by an order of magnitude. Prior to thorons discovery, faster than light vessels were essentially one of three types; courier vessels, colony ships, and scientific scout vessels. This was due to the massive amount of energy and equipment required to punch through to the other reality, severely limiting both fuel supplies and cargo capacity. With proper use of thoron in FTL drive designs, volume and mas requirements dropped off massively, opening up faster than light travel to merchantmen and passenger vessels.

Chemically, thoron is highly volatile, and seems to never leave a liquid state. Even the airborne state of thoron seems to stem from its ease of aerosolization, essentially filling a volume of air with uncountable miniature droplets of thoron. Under temperatures above $TEMPERATURE, thoron will release ionizing radiation and transmute into $DECAY_MATERIAL, which scales exponentially with temperature. However, when in an environment rich in $REACTION_CHEMICAL, thoron will instead "burn," producing $BURN_WASTE_MATERAL and increase the temperature of the environment just as a normal fire would be expected.

Uses
Thoron is used in most spacecraft as a fuel source for their reactors (due to a high ratio of energy vs. volume and mass), and as a critical component of the (now prolific) artificial gravity technologies. In addition, Thoron is used as a reasonably clean power-source on heavily colonized worlds; where the citizenry require the prodigious power output thoron can provide.

History
After its discovery, the "Orange Rush" began. In the end, NanoTrasen ended up in control of 50% of Gliese 229B, while other corporations were permitted to mine the sattelites as well as harvest the other half of the giant.

Supply


Accidents
Most accidents, usually containment breaches or uncontrollable fires, were swept under the rug; much like how a addict will forgive his dealer for his character flaws. NanoTrasen the dealer; Thoron the next glorious fix.

Multispacial Thoron Crystal
Multispacial Thoron Crystals (commonly referred to as "MTC"s or "supermatter") are an exceedingly rare form of Thoron, a pseudo-stable crystallized form of the nearly-the-definition-of-volatile substance. The current supply in use originated from a scientific mission to SCR 1845-6357, where it was discovered that an asteroid belt around the binary pair had some irregularities. These irregularities were discovered to stem form a previously undiscovered form of thoron, which spawned what amounted to a smaller Orange Rush. Since this supply has been completely exhausted, the current supply in use is all that is possessed by humanity, and thus has a very high price.

OUT OF DATE FOLLOWS is extracted from the cores of super plasma giants, at great expenditure of effort and material, by robotic armored probes, shielded and designed to withstand the intense pressure that solidifies Plasma into a stable almost inert but highly volatile form.

The super matter has a similar density to neutronium and expels a massive amount of energy and gaseous plasma when properly processed. - Being super-dense, Zero Point Lasers are used to shave off plasma molecules from the crystal lattice matrix. These lasers can not interact with less dense matter in a significant fashion, such as organic tissues and are thus perfectly harmless. The Super Matter however is not.

Extensive and costly experimentation have determined that while stable at the near vacuous existence of hard vacuum or one standard earth atmosphere, super-matter begins to come unravelled when reaching pressure levels similar to its origins, - thus attributing to its expenditure in harvesting it. Heat further weakens the crystal matrix structure.

Should the matter come unraveled, it will do so extremely rapidly and explosively, ripping not only through the hardest alloys like wet tissues, but the very fabric of time itself, thus giving rise to the curious phenomena where one can in fact survive a Super Matter detonation by simply outrunning the explosive wave as it tears steel bulkhead to shreds. Slowly. It is still recommended to evacuate the site of such a explosion without delay.

Super Matter is currently only used in the NSV Luna for fuel and propulsion purposes. And is estimated to outlast the ships service period by a factor of 15. With proper care and maintenance. And barring any accidents.

OUT OF DATE ENDS