3.2 Transwarp Field Generator (White Lightning Core)

Over the last two decades, Starfleet has captured a number of Borg Transwarp cores. While Starfleet and the Federation have had limited success in reproducing a working Transwarp core, we have been able to integrate these captured cores into Starfleet vessel systems, resulting in significantly improved starship speeds.

However, the limited number of cores (less than four dozen total) has prevented any real experimentation with other uses for these core elements. Over the last five years, many of these captured Transwarp cores have suffered breakdowns and burnouts. In particular, many are suffering from coil degradation, making them unsafe for continued use as a propulsion system for starships.

Many of these degraded Transwarp cores were sent to Federation contractors so that further research could be conducted using them, with a goal of designing a Transwarp core that could be reproduced and manufactured. Whitestone Enterprises received such a degraded Transwarp core on Stardate 239909.14.

Unfortunately, Whitestone Enterprises has been unable to reproduce this core as a propulsion system. However, further experimentation with the cores produced has had other beneficial effects. On Stardate 240004.21, Whitestone linked the degraded Borg Transwarp core to a standard isolinear computer core removed from a Spectre class fighter after first removing the subspace field generators from this core. While the experiment was not initially successful, a second attempt on Stardate 240005.14 produced a modified computer core that successfully used the Borg Transwarp coil as its subspace field generator.

This computer core produced base computational speeds approximately twice as fast as a standard computer core. Upon further testing it was found that one of the non-propulsion cores produce speeds as much as three times faster than standard starship computer cores. Data transfer rate was also significantly increased over standard optical lines, to nearly 8,000 kiloquads per second. Over QTDN lines, the effect boosted the quantum-mechanical transference effect to over 12,000 kiloquads\second.

The increased speed was unfortunately not without disadvantages. When used in this fashion, the Transwarp coil produces hard radiation of a previously undiscovered type in a radius of approximately 35 meters. Whitestone Enterprises was successful in developing a shielding based on a sodium-boron/lead and rodinium weave surrounding the computer core that is opaque to this radiation; however, it would be extremely hazardous to any sentient to enter a computer core using this technology. When maintenance is needed, the TW-coil is powered down and room flushed from radiation, allowing the engineering crews full access to the computer core Whitestone has tentatively named this radiation "Phi radiation," in honor of the Greek letter most closely resembling the role of a modern letter 'W.' It is possible that this radiation was causes the same degradation that renders borg coils unusable for propulsion. Further experimentation is needed before the new coils are usable for propulsion.

Second, Transwarp computer cores, which were called "White Lightning" computer cores, may not be used within 120 meters of a traditional subspace field coil computer core. It was found that an unshielded White Lightning core would produce extremely disruptive effects to the older computer technology. It has been theorized that the Transwarp field collapses the timing elements of the traditional subspace field coil, rendering the traditional coil unable to communicate due to timing issues.

To prevent core degradation, we have employed several techniques to keep the cores from further degradation. First the coils are fitted in pairs, with each being turned off 50% of the time for maintenance. Second, specialized Transwarp-safe nanites are used to restore the damage caused by the Phi radiation that the cores emit. Tests using this new approach have concluded that the radiation is a side effect of the cores themselves, and that the Borg use their customized nanites to constantly repair Transwarp coils as they are being used.