Heinlein, Robert Anson —(prop n) American romanticist of the Old Modern period.
Holie —(n) Abbreviated form of “hologram.” Any three-dimensional image. Colloquially, a projected, dynamic three-dimensional image, or device for producing same.
Hour, Barnardean —(n) A measure of time equal to 0.998264 standard hours, or 3593.75 standard seconds. Since the Barnardean day is 460.8 standard hours long, the Barnardean hour permits the day to be divided into 23 twenty-hour “pids” or 46 ten-hour “shifts,” and avoids the problems of attempting to base a clock on divisions of the prime number 461. Attributed to Bascal Edward de Towaji Lutui.
Hypercollapsite —(n) A quasi-crystalline material composed of neuble-mass black holes. Usually organized as a vacuogel.
Hypercomputer —(n) Any computing device capable of altering its internal layout. Colloquially, a computing device made of wellstone.
Hypermass —(adj) A mass which has been hypercompressed; a black hole.
Imbria —(prop n) Temperate Luner nation of the northern hemisphere, on the former Nearside, with a population of approximately 10 million.
Immorbid —(adj) Not subject to life-threatening disease or deterioration.
Impervium —(n) Public domain wellstone substance; the hardest superreflector known.
Indeceased —(n, adj) Luner colloquialism for senile Olders who are incapable of useful learning or work.
Inload —(v) To download information directly into the brain, as through a neural halo.
Instantiate (also print) —(v) To produce a single instance of a person or object; to fax from a stored or received pattern.
Instelnet —(prop n) The low-bandwidth lightspeed data network connecting the Queendom of Sol and its thirteen colony systems.
Judder —(v, n) To vibrate energetically. As a noun, a motion artifact produced when stored images are played back incorrectly. Judder can be employed deliberately as part of an error correction scheme in defective fax machine print plates.
Juke —(v) To move unexpectedly out of position. Colloquially, to cheat or deceive.
Juris Doctor —(n) A formal law degree conferred by Queendom authorities or their proxies.
Kataki hau o kai —Traditional Tongan encouragement to begin a meal. Literally: “For your patience, come and eat.”
kps —(abbrev) Kilometers per second, a measure of velocity for celestial bodies and interplanetary/interstellar vehicles. The speed of light is 300,000 kps. (Also kips, kiss.)
Kuiper Belt —(n) A ring-shaped region in the ecliptic plane of any solar system in which gravitational perturbations have amplified the concentration of large, icy bodies or “comets.” Sol's Kuiper Belt extends from 40 AU at its lower boundary to 1000 AU at its upper and has approximately one-fourth the overall density of the much smaller Asteroid Belt. The total mass of the Kuiper Belt exceeds that of Earth.
Light-minute —(n) The distance traveled by light through a standard vacuum in one minute: 17,987,547.6 kilometers or 0.12 AU.
Light-second —(n) The distance traveled by light through a standard vacuum in one second: 299, 792.46 kilometers.
Light-year —(n) The distance traveled by light through a standard vacuum in one year: 9.4607 trillion kilometers or 63,238 AU.
Lipofuscin —(n) An inert pigment whose buildup within the cells of a multicellular organism is both a marker and a determinant of geriatry. Lipofuscin levels in excess of 3% of cell volume are generally considered fatal in the long term.
Luddite —(n) A follower, adherent, or admirer of the principles of Ned Ludd, an organizer of nineteenth-century English craftsmen who rioted for the destruction of industrial technologies seen as displacing or dehumanizing.
Luna —(prop n) Original name of Earth's moon.
Lune (also the Squozen Moon, the Half Moon )—(prop n) Name attaching to Earth's moon following the terraforming operations which reduced its diameter from 3500 to 1400 kilometers.
Maglev —(n) Any vehicle, device, or system employing levitation by means of magnetic fields.
Malo e lelei —Traditional Tongan greeting widely used within the Queendom. Literally: “Thank you for coming.”
Matter programming —(n) The discipline of arranging, sequencing, and utilizing pseudomaterials in a wellstone or other programmable-matter matrix, often including the in situ management of energy and computing resources.
Megaklick —(n) A near-planetary measure of distance: one million kilometers, or 3.33564 light-seconds.
Megayear —(n) One million years.
Meritocratic —(adj) Of or pertaining to meritocracy. A state in which effort and talent are presumed to yield social or monetary advancement.
Microgee —(n) A measure of gravitational acceleration: one-millionth of a gee, or 9.8 micrometers per second squared.
Millibar —(n) A measure of atmospheric pressure equivalent to one-thousandth of an Earth atmosphere at sea level. Partial pressures of oxygen in the 70-millibar range are generally considered breathable.
Monospecific —(adj) Composed of a single species.
Mutagen —(n) Any agent that tends to increase the extent or frequency of genetic mutation.
Nanobe —(n) Any living or self-replicating system smaller than 500 nanometers in linear dimension. Most often used in reference to implantable medical devices.
Narrowband —(adj) Describes any signal, carrier, or network with a bandwidth less than 100 MHz or an effective data rate less than 100 Mbit/sec.
Nasen —(n) An acronym: Neutrino Amplification through Stimulated EmissioN. A monochromatic beam of high-energy neutrinos sometimes employed for interplanetary communication thanks to its extremely small divergence angle. However, the difficulty of generating such a beam, plus its ready interactions with matter, limit its usefulness except as a weapon.
Nescog, the —(prop n) NEw Systemwide COllapsiter Grid. Sol system's successor to the Inner System Collapsiter Grid or Iscog; an ultra-high-bandwidth telecommunications network employing numerous supraluminal signal shunts.
Neuble —(n) A diamond-clad neutronium sphere, explosively formed, usually incorporating one or more layers of wellstone for added strength and versatility. A standard industrial neuble masses one billion metric tons, with a radius of 2.67 centimeters.
Neutronium —(n) Matter which has been supercondensed, crushing nuclear protons and orbital electron shells together into a continuous mass of neutrons. Unstable except at very high pressures. Any quantity of neutronium may be considered a single atomic nucleus; however, under most conditions the substance will behave as a superfluid.
Neutronium barge (also Neutronium dredge )—(n) A space vessel, typically one billion cubic meters (1000 ¥ 1000 ¥ 1000 m) or larger, whose primary function is to gather mass, supercompress it into neutronium, and transport it to a depot or work site. Although less numerous, smaller neutronium barges also existed for transport only.
Nubia —(prop n) Subtropical Luner nation of the southern hemisphere, on the former Nearside, with a population of approximately 100 million.