List of Star Trek regions of space

The Briar Patch is a nebula in sector 441 in the Star Trek universe. It was first introduced in the 1998 film Star Trek: Insurrection. While the nebula's visual characteristics are reminiscent of astronomical photographs, many of its more interesting properties were invented to support the film's storyline.

Located in

The planet featured in Star Trek: Insurrection is a class-M world; it is unusual for its possession of an intricate planetary ring system. The Ba'ku have established a colony on the surface, where the colonists rejected most forms of advanced technology and attempted to create a utopian society. Some time after their arrival, the colonists discovered that "metaphasic radiation" from the Briar Patch has become concentrated in the planet's rings, continually rejuvenating their genetic structure; unbeknownst to the outside universe, the Ba'ku planet is effectively a fountain of youth.

Briar Patch in Star Trek: Enterprise

The Klingon system Klach D'Kel Brakt is also given the designation "Briar Patch" by Dr

The Delphic Expanse, commonly abbreviated as "the Expanse", is the setting for the entire third season of Star Trek: Enterprise, first aired in 2003 and 2004.

The Expanse is about 2000 light years across, surrounded by thick

Species native to the Expanse include the Loque'eque, the Skagarans, the Triannon, and the Xindi.

Featured locations of the Expanse include

History of the Expanse

Thousands of years ago, a number of

In about 2133, a group of Klingons enter the Expanse, but return anatomically inverted (and still alive). Unsuccessful attempts to explore the region are also made by the Vulcan ships Seleya and Vaankara. The Seleya is later discovered with its crew driven mad due to exposure to Trellium-D, and subsequently destroyed.

In about June 2153, the Earth Starfleet ship Enterprise (NX-01) enters the Expanse to locate the Xindi. It is followed later in the year by the Andorian ship Kumari.

On February 13, 2154, the Enterprise destroys the network of Spheres, reverting the distorted space to its natural form, and gradually dissipating the thermobaric cloud barrier. The Expanse thus ceases to exist, becoming a normal, unthreatening region of space.^[5]

Although the Enterprise's Captain Jonathan Archer is shown a possible timeline in which the Expanse becomes a major threat to the future United Federation of Planets, this eventuality appears to be eliminated by the successful destruction of the Spheres.

Galactic Barrier and Great Barrier

In the Star Trek universe, the Galactic Barrier (also referred to as the Great Barrier or Energy Barrier) is an energy field that surrounds the Milky Way Galaxy. The field completely encompasses the galactic disk, preventing a conventional starship from traveling beyond the edge of the galaxy. It is not clear whether the energy barrier is a natural or artificially created phenomenon.

Although numerous attempts to travel outside the galaxy are made, with various degrees of success, the barrier usually damages or destroys ships that try to pass through it. It also has psychoactive effects; some personnel gain powerful

The Galactic Barrier makes its first appearance in the original series episode "Where No Man Has Gone Before", in which the crew of the USS Enterprise must deal with those affected by the psychic powers of the field—as did the crew of the ill-fated SS Valiant, which encountered the same barrier two centuries earlier.

The barrier is encountered again in the episode "Is There in Truth No Beauty?", where the Enterprise becomes lost within the barrier and is saved by the astounding navigational skills of an alien passenger.

The barrier had also damaged an alien ship from outside the galaxy, as explained in the episode "By Any Other Name", stranding the aliens until they try to steal the Enterprise and return to their home galaxy, Andromeda.

A second barrier at the core of the Milky Way is first revealed in the motion picture Star Trek V: The Final Frontier. Being the only encounter ever shown, the only known reference is the "Great Barrier". This energy barrier at the core is thought to be impenetrable like the one at the edge of the galaxy; however, it is revealed that only mankind's natural fear of the unknown is keeping mankind from entering it.

Non-canonical explanations

Various books try to explain the existence of the galactic barrier, although none of these are canonical:

• The series of novels known as Star Trek: The Q Continuum explain the two barriers, stating that they were created by the Continuum 600,000 years ago, to keep one omnipotent being (known as "The One", which is the same alien encountered in Star Trek V: The Final Frontier) sealed away at the center of the Galaxy, and to keep another (known as "0", whose powers can rival even the Q) locked out of the galaxy forever; this is due to both aliens' previous destructive rampages.
• In William Shatner's novel Captain's Glory, Picard mentions the events of the Q Continuum trilogy, but states that the barrier was built by the proto-humanoids shown in "The Chase" 4 billion years ago, to protect their "children" (the races they seeded across the galaxy) from a dark matter entity known as the Totality.
• The novel Q-Squared reveals the Galactic Barrier to be Q himself, in a time-tossed and temporally discorporated state.

Galactic quadrants

In the original Star Trek, "quadrant" is used interchangeably with "sector". However, beginning with Star Trek: The Next Generation, the term refers to a galactic coordinate system.

Galactic quadrants within Star Trek are based around a meridian that runs from the center of the galaxy through Earth's

According to StarTrek.com, "if the great plane of the galaxy is viewed as a clock face and the 6 o'clock position bisects the Sol system"[6] (when viewed from the galactic north pole), then the four fictional quadrants are as follows:

• Alpha Quadrant is the quarter appearing between 6 and 9 o'clock.
• Beta Quadrant is the quarter appearing between 3 and 6 o'clock.
• Gamma Quadrant is the quarter appearing between 9 and 12 o'clock.
• Delta Quadrant is the quarter appearing between 12 and 3 o'clock.

Alpha and Beta Quadrants

The Alpha Quadrant and the nearby areas of the Beta Quadrant comprise the primary setting of

.

Star Trek Encyclopedia attributes this decision to rationalize a line in Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan, in which James T. Kirk claims that the Enterprise is the only Federation ship in the quadrant.^[7][8] Maps produced by the art staff for the series show that the Alpha/Beta border runs through the Solar System.^[9]

The Star Trek Star Charts claim that the Beta Quadrant contains the core worlds

Betazed.^[9]

Gamma Quadrant

The Dominion, which is one of the most aggressive antagonists in the Deep Space Nine TV series, control a large portion of the Gamma Quadrant. The Alpha Quadrant comes in contact with the Dominion through the Bajoran wormhole, which is the setting and primary source of conflict in the series.

Delta Quadrant

Most of the information about the Delta Quadrant and its inhabitants comes from the series

Hirogen

, and the Malon.

Galactic Core

On some Star Trek maps of the center of the galaxy, the galactic core is regarded as its own area, not part of any of the four Quadrants. The Cytherians, from the Next Generation episode "The Nth Degree," are located near this area. In Star Trek V: The Final Frontier, a "God"-being is encountered from within what is called the "Great Barrier".

Nekrit Expanse

The Nekrit Expanse is a vast unpopulated nebular region in the Delta Quadrant, several thousand light years across. It is impossible to chart due to its constantly changing structure. As a result of its size, the Expanse functions as a natural barrier, limiting contact between species on either side of the cloud. The USS Voyager enters the expanse in 2373.^[11][12]

Neutral Zone

In the Star Trek

universe, a neutral zone is a sort of "buffer zone" between the territories of two different powers; if either party enters a neutral zone, it is considered an aggressive move (usually an act of war). In the course of the various series, the Federation develops two neutral zones: One with the Klingon Empire and one with the Romulan

Star Empire; the generic term "the Neutral Zone" usually refers to the Romulan Neutral Zone. Also, a neutral zone in all but name exists between the Federation and the Cardassians.

Cardassian Demilitarized Zone

There is a Federation-Cardassian demilitarized zone created at the end of hostilities between the two powers in the mid-24th century. The peace treaty ending the war and subsequent border adjustments result in several Federation worlds within the zone being ceded to the Cardassians. Militant Federation colonists called the Maquis form a guerrilla militia to oppose the treaty and their new Cardassian administrators; they receive assistance from sympathetic Federation citizens, including several Starfleet officers, and from Bajoran veterans of the long Cardassian occupation of Bajor. The DMZ ceases to exist at the outbreak of the Dominion War in 2373; the Maquis are subsequently eliminated as a functional resistance group by a joint Cardassian-Dominion task force.

Klingon Neutral Zone

The Klingon Neutral Zone, sometimes known as the

Organian Neutral Zone, appears to be set up during the time of the Star Trek: The Original Series

. Unlike the Romulan Neutral Zone, the Klingon Neutral Zone appears to have some commercial traffic crossing it.

The Organians are non-corporeal beings from the planet Organia IV, which is strategically situated between the Klingon Empire and the Federation. When both parties, thinking the Organians are a pre-industrial people, attempt to occupy their world, the Organians reveal their posthuman nature and impose the Neutral Zone and a peace treaty between the two powers. In Klingon, this treaty is known as orghenya' rojmab (Organian Peace Treaty).

The zone is the site of the Kobayashi Maru scenario in the film Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan.

The Klingon Neutral Zone is abolished by the

Khitomer Accords

in 2293.

In Star Trek Into Darkness, set in an alternate reality, the USS Enterprise violates the Neutral Zone to capture Khan Noonien Singh.

Romulan Neutral Zone

The Romulan Neutral Zone is established around 2160 or 2161 by the treaty of Algeron which ends the

starbase quickly when the crew is suffering accelerated aging, once when it is commandeered by a group of disestablishmentarians in their quest for paradise, and once more when the Federation attempts to steal a Romulan cloaking device.^[13]

The Neutral Zone remains uncrossed during a period of extended Romulan

Borg. The following year, the USS Yamato crosses into the Neutral Zone to prevent the Romulans from finding the Iconian home world, an abandoned planet that contains highly advanced technology

. In 2366, the Romulan scout ship Pi crashes just inside of Federation space, and a Romulan ship crosses over to recover survivors. Finally, in the same year, a Romulan defects to the Federation, breaching the Neutral Zone, warning of a secret plan to attack the Federation; the Enterprise-D, along with three Klingon warships, in turn, cross the Neutral Zone to investigate the claim.

Subsequent covert incursions of the Neutral Zone include the Romulans' plan to invade Vulcan using disguised Vulcan ships. An overt but lawful entry into the Neutral Zone occurs when the USS Bellerophon participates in a Federation–Romulan conference on Romulus during the Dominion War.

In

Star Trek Nemesis

, Shinzon lies that he wishes to take down the zone as part of his ultimately failed plot to destroy Earth and the rest of the Federation.

Following the destruction of Romulus in 2387, the Romulan Empire collapsed. With no formal government to enforce the treaty, the Romulan Neutral Zone ceased to exist.^[14]

Sector 001

This section needs expansion. You can help by adding to it. (April 2022)

Sector 001 is the Federation designation for the area of space that contains the Solar System. The term "Sector 001" is used in the Next Generation episode "The Best of Both Worlds".^[15]

Spatial anomaly

In Star Trek and other science fiction, a spatial anomaly (or, often, a sub-space anomaly) is a broad term for any sort of extraordinary disruption in the

laws of physics, and areas of disruption inimical to the human

brain.

The

transdimensional

realm.

Other episodes featuring spatial anomalies are "Disaster", which features two quantum filaments that temporarily cripple the Enterprise, the series finale of Star Trek: The Next Generation (in which the USS Enterprise-D encounters a "multiphasic temporal convergence in the spacetime continuum", caused by "an eruption of anti-time"), and "One Small Step" (in which the USS Voyager discovers a rare "graviton ellipse").

References

1. ^
   ISBN 0-671-53609-5
   .
2. ^ "The Journal of the Royal Astronomical Society of Canada – February 1998 Volume 92 Number 1 pp. 3, 51" (PDF). Archived from the original (PDF) on 2012-06-19. Retrieved 2016-09-10.
3. ^ Star Trek: Enterprise episode "The Augments"
4. ^ Star Trek: Deep Space Nine episode "Blood Oath"
5. ^ Delphic Expanse Archived 2007-10-29 at the Wayback Machine and its spheres Archived 2008-10-07 at the Wayback Machine at official site StarTrek.com
6. ^ "Star Trek Alpha Quadrant". Startrek.com. Retrieved 2010-08-17.
7. ^
   ISBN 0-671-53609-5
   .
8. ISBN 1-85286-676-4
   .
9. ^
   ISBN 0-7434-3770-5
   .
10. ISBN 978-0-275-98164-8
    .
11. ^ Fair Trade (Star Trek: Voyager) and subsequent episodes
12. ^ Nekrit Expanse Archived 2008-07-04 at the Wayback Machine at StarTrek.com
13. ^ Romulan Neutral Zone Archived 2008-06-05 at the Wayback Machine at StarTrek.com
14. ^ Stardust City Rag (Star Trek: Picard) in the Internet Movie Database
15. ^ "The Best of Both Worlds". Star Trek: The Next Generation. Season 3. Episode 26. 1990-06-18.