Science Fiction Dictionary
A  B  C  D  E  F  G  H  I  J  K  L  M  N  O  P  Q  R  S  T  U  V  W  X  Y  Z

Latest By
Category:


Armor
Artificial Intelligence
Biology
Clothing
Communication
Computers
Culture
Data Storage
Displays
Engineering
Entertainment
Food
Input Devices
Lifestyle
Living Space
Manufacturing
Material
Media
Medical
Miscellaneous
Robotics
Security
Space Tech
Spacecraft
Surveillance
Transportation
Travel
Vehicle
Virtual Person
Warfare
Weapon
Work

"At its best, SF is the medium in which our miserable certainty that tomorrow will be different from today in ways we can't predict, can be transmuted to a sense of excitement and anticipation, occasionally evolving into awe."
- John Brunner

Luxobe Crystals  
  They give light.  

He deposited the native on a couch and turned. In a wall compartment he found a tiny Venus lantern with a wire handle. From his pocket he withdrew two small crystals, each the size of a pea. They might have been crystals of galena, judging from appearance, but when the vapor of the sealed glass tube struck the crystals they became splinters of cold, brilliant light, flinging a glow about the entire room.

The ribbed beryllium walls were exposed nakedly, with an oval window at the rear hung with curtains of silver cloth. Those curtains were Enid's contribution to the homeliness of an interior that presented an aspect of cheerlessness and austerity, characterized by the forbidding frigidity of unadorned metal walls and metal furnishings.

With the terrestrial value on Venus moon crystals so high, he had rarely used them during the ten daylight hours. These luxobe crystals were like radio-active minerals in a way, being continually dissipated through a radiated flow of energy, except that their rate of demolition, as compared with radium, was very rapid.

In a vapor of monoxide, these crystals radiated away as rays of sheer light. For a period varying from three months to a year of terrestrial Earth hours, these amazing little crystals would dwindle away as light, and then they would be gone.

It was for these moon crystals that Omar Klegg had come to the cloud planet. These fragmentary minerals, inactive in the ordinary atmosphere of Venus, were scattered over the surface of the planet, and it was suspected that these many particles once composed a satellite, circling the mother planet. Hence they had been called moon crystals, since the breaking up of such an astral body could explain their haphazard scattering about the surface of Venus.

Technovelgy from Moon Crystals, by J. Harvey Haggard.
Published by Astounding Stories in 1936
Additional resources -

Compare to lux from The Black Star Passes by John W. Campbell (1930) and the glowglobe from Dune by Frank Herbert (1965) and illumium from Altered Carbon by Richard Morgan (2003).

Comment/Join this discussion ( 0 ) | RSS/XML | Blog This |

Additional resources:
  More Ideas and Technology from Moon Crystals
  More Ideas and Technology by J. Harvey Haggard
  Tech news articles related to Moon Crystals
  Tech news articles related to works by J. Harvey Haggard

Articles related to Material
Nano-Chainmail 2D Mechanically Interlocked Polymer
Goldene - A Two-Dimensional Sheet Of Gold One Atom Thick
GNoME AI From DeepMind Invents Millions Of New Materials
Omniphobic Liquid-like Surfaces And de Camp's Telelubricator (1940)

Want to Contribute an Item? It's easy:
Get the name of the item, a quote, the book's name and the author's name, and Add it here.

<Previous
Next>

Google
  Web TechNovelgy.com   

 

 

Technovelgy (that's tech-novel-gee!) is devoted to the creative science inventions and ideas of sf authors. Look for the Invention Category that interests you, the Glossary, the Science Fiction Invention Timeline, or see what's New.

 

 

 

 

Science Fiction Timeline
1600-1899
1900-1939
1940's   1950's
1960's   1970's
1980's   1990's
2000's   2010's

Science Fiction in the News

Stargate $500 Billion Investment in Artificial Intelligence
'... an artificial intelligence equal to the human.'

Jetson Orin Nano Super 70 Just $249
'Rayno folded up the microterm and tucked it back inside his jumper.'

Nano-Chainmail 2D Mechanically Interlocked Polymer
'Nemourlon armor of reasonable weight resists penetration by most fragments and any bullet that is not both reasonably heavy and fairly high-velocity.'

Anker's SOLIX Solar Umbrella Portable Power
As predicted by science fiction thirty-five years ago!

Positioned Cybertrucks With Free Starlinks WiFi In LA
'Several thousand of them formed the positioning grid on the rubble pile.'

AI-THu Shapeshifting Transformer Home
'Its slack walls tightened, bulged, were crossed by ripples and waves of movement.'

Xiaomi Self-Driving Self-Balancing Scooter
'Norman... had never ridden any motorized device that lacked onboard steering and balance systems.'

Transparent 4K OLED Wireless TV From LG
You will note that HG Wells also figured out the aspect ratio of the future!

TSA 2 - Advanced Thermosensory Stimulator Is A Dune Pain Box
'As though a switch had been turned off, the pain stopped...'

Humans Love Helping Other Species
'At the ringside opposite them a table had been removed to make room for a large transparent plastic capsule on wheels.'

More SF in the News

More Beyond Technovelgy

Home | Glossary | Science Fiction Timeline | Category | New | Contact Us | FAQ | Advertise |
Technovelgy.com - where science meets fiction™

Copyright© Technovelgy LLC; all rights reserved.