Elerium-115

The fictional element 'Elerium' is the 115th element in the Periodic Table. When bombarded with a certain kind of particles, it creates an anti-matter reaction that releases anti-gravity waves as a byproduct. Therefore, Elerium can either be used for its antigravity, allowing very fast atmospheric and/or space flight, as well as small and efficient personal 'flight packs' that aren't dependant on noisy, bulky and clumsy reactive jet engines, or as an astonishingly efficient power source that can be used to power electronic equipment of any size, or even as a highly explosive weapon. A tiny quantity of Elerium was sufficient to power huge aircraft for many hours. One of the disadvantages of Elerium is that it loses most of its properties and becomes inert when it comes into contact with seawater, a bitter lesson learned in the period between the first and second Alien Wars.

HISTORY

The aliens of the 1st Alien War used Elerium in almost every device they constructed, from one-handed weapons to huge UFO power reactors. After X-Com conducted the neccessary research to understand the advanced technologies the aliens used, they realized what kind of advantages could be gained from this incredible element, and so began to raid alien UFO's and bases not only to combat their presence on Earth, but also to procur Elerium for their newly constructed equipment that used Elerium as a power source.

Unfortunately, no planet or asteroid in our solar system contained Elerium veins, nor was it possible to synthesize this element at any quantity. After the aliens were initially defeated, Earth was in a problem. Over the years preceding the Second Alien War, many expeditions were sent to longtime crashed UFO's, some of them underwater, to scrap any tiny amount of Elerium availible. The supplies of Elerium dwindled dispite the limitations the various governments placed on its usage (which prohibited the use of Elerium for anything save propulsion research), and eventually completely dissapeared.

When the aliens of the Second Alien War became active, they did not use Elerium at all. Instead, they used a synthetic substitude that became known as Zrbite, which was synthesized from gold and some strange alien bio-material. Although it had the same great efficiency as an energy source Elerium did, it was not an effective substitute, mainly because it was dependent on a bulky global energy grid, that once shut down rendered Zrbite completely inert and useless. So, after the Second Alien War was over, humanity, which believed they have found a solution to the Elerium problem, had to keep searching for an answer for several more years.

Fortunately, further investment into space-flight technology research allowed for the creation of relatively cheap fusion reactors, that eventually led to the colonization of distant planets. Natural Elerium deposits were discovered in other solar systems and mined by independant mining corporations - Earth was now recieving a stable, if somewhat limited, supply of Elerium 115. While fusion remained the primary civilian energy source due to its cheaper pricetag (as the quantity of Elerium was still not large, and also because local rebellions of the mining colonies kept spiking the price of Elerium up), Elerium was still used widely for antigravity vehicles, some weapons, and military power plants - as it was way more efficient than fusion energy.

Although through recent efforts scientists have been able to synthesize Elerium in laboratory conditions, it appears that the process is not as practical as it seemed at first, since all Elerium supplies are still mined even 20 years after the initial sucess in synthesizing it.

Record 592 - technology - Last update 28 Mar 2007, 23:04:36

Entry written by: Wicked

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