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Element Zero and the Dirac Sea: An In-Depth Explanation
Authors: Dr. Sean Michaels Sc.D, Dr. Daniel Nemo Sc.D, Biss'Relven vas Explorer
Organized by: Dr. Sean Michaels Sc.D
Internally Published: June 6th, 2189
Element Zero, or Eezo as it's more commonly called, is an element with a unique trait; when an electrical charge is applied to it, the mass of whatever object connected to it will decrease. This is common knowledge to anyone even partially versed in the world of engineering, but it is still important to mention. Despite being one of the most commonly used elements in the galaxy, there is still very little we know about it outside of its obvious uses on starships, air speeders, and other pieces of common equipment found in the world. But, what does it really do? How does Eezo affect us and the world around us?
Let's start with the formation of Eezo. Eezo is a common byproduct of supernovae, whereas heavily-compressed matter is ejected from the core of a dying star. In rarer cases, Eezo can be "ejected" from the hearts of black holes, especially those on the verge of "evaporating" as they are shrunk and destabilized by Hawking radiation. Only through strong sources of gravity, sources strong enough to warp the relativistic fabric of our universe, is Eezo created, making it impossible to reproduce on a small scale with our level of technology.
Despite its widespread use in everyday applications, Eezo remains an enigma of sorts to physicists, engineers, and those born with the element flowing through their own bloodstream. It wasn't until the Reaper War and the discovery of the ancient Crucible Project that many of the questions regarding Eezo were answered, changing our fundamental understanding of the element forever. In layman's terms, Eezo "bridges" the gap between two dimensions, both existing in tandem, yet separately at the same time. Imagine it as an infinitely-stretching Möbius Strip and that gives you a good idea of how the dimensions intertwine.
This dimension doesn't exist as a "mirror" or "reflection" of our own, however. It is an infinite vacuum of negatively-charged particles known as the Dirac Sea, first postulated by the human physicist Paul Dirac in 1930. They're shifting and churning with the stars, black holes, and planets in our dimension, acting as the wind and waves and creating massive "clouds" of antimatter over many years (years being subjective, of course, it is impossible to tell how "time" functions in this dimension in regards to our own). Through large, gravitational sources such as these, Eezo is slowly created from negatively-charged particles, being "ripped" from their reality by the gravitons present in the centers of these masses. This is where the "gap" is bridged. The more numerous the gravitons, the larger the possible quantity of Eezo.
So how does this factor into the Crucible Project from the Reaper War? The answer to that is a little more complicated. Using the Dirac Sea as the explanation isn't entirely accurate in this context. Rather than function purely as a dimension of negatively-charged particles, they exist in the quantum fabric of our universe, affecting all physical matter in our world while also existing in their negatively-charged state. The fact is, these particles, in the presence of a strong gravitational force, can affect matter in negative ways, including (but not limited to) creating q-balls in stars; sapping their energy and causing premature death, interfering with the strength of planetary cores; affecting surface gravity and indirectly causing natural disasters, and above all else, "reabsorbing" waste energy from Eezo reactions that further accelerate these phenomena.
The Crucible Project created a quantum "vacuum", forcing these particles into one location where they could be redistributed to another layer of the "dimension". In this case, absorbing the excess negative particles from an affected star "charged" the device, reversing the damage inflicted on the star and allowing that energy to be redistributed somewhere else, such as the quantum communication network linking all the Reaper forces together. Overloading this network fried the Reaper's mental and mechanical processes, along with the brains of all other creatures enthralled by the Reaper indoctrination signal.
Outside of its original role as a Reaper-killing weapon, the Crucible has been used to restore various stars to their proper equilibrium, allowing for the recolonization of several worlds previously believed to be impractical due to irregular solar activity from their stars. Doing this has also had the unintended effect of shifting the flow of the Dirac Sea, stabilizing several planets as it has shifted away in response to the vacuum created by the Crucible.