Phasers

PHASER is an acronym for PHASed Energy Rectification, which is a high-energy directed "beam" weapon. This weapon is the lead defensive system maintained by Starfleet Command for sublight use during the last century. It is used as side arms by Starfleet personnel, or as a starship's or space station's energy weapon.

The phaser energy is released through the application of the Rapid Nadion Effect (RNE). Rapid nadions are short-lived subatomic particles possessing special properties related to high-speed interactions within atomic nuclei. Among these properties is the ability to liberate and transfer strong nuclear forces within a particular class of super-conducting crystals known as "fushigi-no-umi". (The crystals were so named when it appeared to researchers at Starfleet's Tokyo R&D facility that the materials being developed represented a virtual "sea of wonder" before them.)

Personal Phasers

The Personal Phasers are divided into three groups. These are either a) phaser Type-I, otherwise known as hand phasers, which are used primarily when conspicuous weapons are undesirable, b) the larger more powerful phaser Type-II, which are capable of a power setting as high as 16, and c) Phaser Type-III, also known as phaser rifles, which are seldom used.

Ship-board Phasers

Large ship-mounted phaser weapons, often called phaser banks, are standard equipment aboard many Starfleet vessels. They range from the small medium sized Type-IV Phaser Emitters, which are mountable on small vehicles such as shuttle crafts, to the large Type-X Phaser Emitters, which are the largest emitters available for starship use. Individual emitter segments are capable of directing 5.1 megawatts of Phaser energy, and by comparison, the Type-II Personal Phaser is limited to 0.01 megawatts (10,000 watts). The effective tactical range of shipboard Phaser-bank emitters (and most directed energy weapons) are about 300.000 kilometers (about one light second).

In their primary defensive application, the starship or space station phaser arrays, are able to emit single or multiple beams upon a target in an attempt to damage the target structure, sometimes to complete destruction. The Type-X Phaser Emitters are highly adaptable to a variety of situations, from active low-energy scans, to high-velocity ship-to-ship operations.