Species 8472 Database:

Territory Species 8472 were first spotted in Borg space in 2373. Conflict between Species 8472 and the Borg began immediately. The Federation starship USS Voyager came across Species 8472 towards the end of 2373.

The information contained in this database has been downloaded from Voyager's computers.

Species 8472 are not from our universe. They come from a place where they are alone, and nothing else lives there. They travel to our universe through quantum singularities. Species 8472 are interdimensional, and come from a place where there are no stars or planets. It is filled with an organic fluid, and not really space at all, but matter. This space is referred to as fluidic space.

Ideology They have a cold malevolence to them. Their only desire is to conquer, and there is no negotiating with them. Like the Borg ideology of assimilation and "resistance is futile",Species 8472's ideology is "The Weak Will Perish". Species 8472 believe that we have contaminated their space by entering it, and believe that our galaxy is a threat to their genetic purity. Thye want to purge our galaxy of our impurity. Based on their experience with the USS Voyager and its alliance with the Borg collective, they believed that Starfleet was an invasion force, same as the Borg.

History Species 8472 was encountered in 2373, when they were at war with the Borg. Further investigation revealed that the Borg started the war with Species 8472. Species 8472 planned to invade the Federation by impersonating humans and other Federation races. They have incredibly detailed information about Starfleet and human culture, leading to speculation that Species 8472 has already infiltrated the Federation. However, some of their facts are inaccurate, which is the best way to figure out that they aren't who they appear to be.

Ships Species 8472 use organic biomass ships (which appear to be actual living lifeform as opposed to just organic components as evidenced by the vertabrae seen upon entering the ship). Each biomass ship has a crew complement of one. The ships seem to be impervious to Federation (or Borg, for that matter) technology: ship sensors can't penetrate the surface of the biomass ship, transporters can't lock onto it, and the tractor beam has no affect on it. It has been demonstrated that the biomass can dissolve through the hulls of Borg ships and therefore can probably dissolve through the hull of the Voyager. Wherever Species 8472 came from, their ships use warp propulsion with anti-matter technology. Inside the ship, there are organic conduits which carry an electro-dynamic fluid. This quite possibly could be an energy source. There is also a binary matrix laced with neural peptides, which could be their idea of a computer core. The biomass ships have the ability to regenerate themselves.

Medical Species 8472 is telepathic in nature, and at this point, it is unknown if they have a spoken language or not. They emit a bio-electric field that disrupts the transporter, preventing getting a lock on or near them. Narrowing the transporter confinement beam doesn't work. The bio-electric field also prevents tricorders from being able to localize the location of Species 8472. The cells of this species are densely coded and have more than one hundred times the DNA a human cell would have. They have an extrordinary immune response. Anything that enters the cell membrane are immediately destroyed. Therefore, the Borg can't assimilate them. They are highly resistant to all forms of technology. However, species 8472 is vulnerable to the modified nanoprobes. Species 8472 is made of the same material as their ships. They are capable of living in the vaccuum of space with no life support. They can also crawl along the hull of a starship without additional support. They are also capable of regeneration. Species 8472 don't particularly like being in humanoid form and having to do things such as sleep, bi-pedal movement, and breathing oxygen.

Method of Attack Species 8472 attacks with their claws whenever they can. This will transfer their cells to the victim. These cells, once in the victim's blood, will begin to consume the body from the inside out, essentially eating the victim alive. The victim will be conscious during this process because all sedatives and other treatments to the infection are neutralized immediately. While the fire power of one ship is extrordinary, they can combine their fire power by forming a circle with a number of other ships, with one ship in the center of the circle. All the ships fire at the main center ship, which collects the fire power and amplifies it out, causing enough fire power to destroy a planet. Species 8472 are highly intelligent and devious. When they enter the enemy's ship, it will do whatever is the most efficient way to destroy the ship.

Defensive Strategies So far, the only theory as to how to stop Species 8472 is with modified Borg nano-probes which could attack the alien cells before the cells have a chance to destroy the nano-probes.

Species 8472 We haven't actually seen Species 8472 eat a puppy yet, but it fits their general disposition. These dull-named aliens were first seen fighting the Borg, but they seem willing to pick on anyone with the wrong number of legs, ie less than three. Species 8472 come from another universe, in which they are the sole inhabitants, and they seem intent on wiping out all life in this one. They have a fair chance of succeeding too, with biological starships that are totally invulnerable to normal technology, and ultra-powerful immune cells that can eat other beings alive. This view may be biased, coming as it does from one episode of a two-parter. If "Scorpion Part 2" establishes that these guys are gentle, loving creatures, and the one we saw had just eaten too much food coloring, I'll gladly publish a correction. There's a lot of room for speculation in what we know about Species 8472. For instance they seem to travel only a limited distance from the portals to their own universe before returning. Do they run out of fuel? Get homesick? Fill their "bag limit" of humanoids? Forget to tape "Oprah"? As you can see from the pictures kindly provided by LAUBKNIGHT, Species 8472 are extremely cool-looking aliens. What's epecially good is they don't have cliche movie horror features like slavering fangs or ripping claws. They don't even seem to have teeth. What's disturbing is that if we ever meet real aliens, they'll most likely look as weird as Species 8472, not like the usual Trek human-with-a-bumpy-forehead alien. Let's hope they'll be friendly.

(8/9/97: I've just read a review of "Scorpion, Part 2" and it seems Species 8472 are not the mindless killers Part 1 led us to believe (well, duh). The Borg invaded their "fluidic space" (think of a Universe filled with lime pudding) and tried to assimilate them. They probably had little success, but we know how traumatic a Borg attack is. It made Dr Soran try to blow up a star, it made Starfleet build a ship that actually looked cool, and it made Species 8472 try to destroy all humanoid life in the universe. Is it bad, then, for Voyager to cooperate with the Borg to destroy them? Not at all. When you're attacked, you have a right to fight back, and Species 8472 seemed remarkably disinterested in talking out their problems. They seemed to retreat after a few of their ships were destroyed, so there's no need for an all-out war, and we'll probably never see Species 8472 again, more's the pity. I'll leave you with a beautiful piece of verse from Robert W. Service, who'll be suing 8472 as soon as he can get a lawyer into fluidic space: "This is the Law of the Yukon, that only the Strong shall thrive; that surely the Weak shall perish, and only the Fit survive.")

Information provided by LtCmdr Drax

Home Planet: Unknown

Reside in a region filled with organic fluid (fluidic space), entered across an interdimensional rift

Moon: Unknown

Surface: Unknown

Atmosphere: Unknown

Description: Unknown

Life Forms: Unknown, assume Species 8272

Important Features: Unknown

Language: Unknown if they have a spoken language or not, but they rely on telepathy

Family Structure: Unknown

History:
It is uncertain under what circumstances their first encounter with those beings which are not native to our universe took place about five months before Stardate 50948.3, but it may be assumed that it was the Borg who intruded the dimension in which Species 8472 lives, thus provoking a massive counterattack they could not handle.

The enemy was much more powerful than themselves, defeat was near. The ships of Species 8472 are of organic nature. In fact, Species 8472 and their vessels consist of the same organical material.

Cells of this species are densely coded and have more than one hundred times the DNA a human cell would have. Extraordinary immune response. Anything that enters the cell membrane are immediately destroyed.

Species 8472 attacks with their claws whenever they can. This will transfer their cells to the victim. These cells, once in the victim's blood, will begin to consume the body from the inside out, essentially eating the victim alive.

Personality:
There is a cold malevolence to Species 8472. Their only desire is to conquer, and there is no negotiating with them. Like the Borg ideology of assimilation and "resistance is futile", Species 8472's ideology is "The Weak Will Perish".

SPECIES 8472 An overview of this unique life form
As far as we know, Species 8472 was "discovered" by the Borg, which is where the designation of the life form comes from. Completely non-humanoid, these transdimensional aliens are tripedal with a leathery epidermal layer that is purplish or gray-green depending on incidental lighting.

The appendages most likened to arms have a length similar to that of the entire body, which measure, which appear to be about 2.5 to 3 meters tall. The aliens walk in a stooped over posture on either the three legs or in several instances, on all five limbs.

The skull is elongated, with a crowning cranium that probably relates to the telepathic abilities these entities possess. Very striking is the unusual "cross hairs" pupil of 8472's eyes, which is golden in coloration. Portions of the external anatomy seem to barely cover the massive skeletal structures underneath. He necks and spinal column of these creatures have several well defined orifices, the physiology of which is unknown at this time. It has been suggested that this has something to do with the extreme agility the species is alleged to demonstrate.

In addition, the species demonstrates extreme strength, the ability to pierce force fields, rip through the bulkheads of modern spacecraft, and to dispatch it's humanoid adversaries with apparent ease.

The bodily movement of the creature has been described as sort of bobbing and swaying, as if it is some fluid environment. This is probably due to the nature of the fluidic space in the subspace dimension species 8472 inhabits. They seem capable of surviving and acting in virtually any environment from the vacuum of space to the controlled environment of Federation, Borg and other alien life support parameters.

Species 8472 is an extremely intelligent life form, having developed an extremely impressive array of advanced technologies including organic based bio-ships which have the same essential and completely unique DNA structure as the species itself. They have developed beam weapons that are so powerful that just passing near one can throw a large starship off it's course. This beam weapon can apparently disable and destroy Borg vessels with ease plus they can combine their beam output in a unbelievably intense show of power that has been used to destroy entire planets.

Species 8472 exists in a parallel subspace dimension that can only be accessed through a quantum singularity. This unexplored dimension is called "fluidic space" as the entire dimension has an atmosphere of somewhat dense organic fluid. It appears that the only inhabitants of this dimension are species 8472, although they may have eliminated any other life forms that may have existed in that dark realm.

One interesting aspect of fluidic space is the fact that entry into the dimension creates a powerful compression wave that effectively alerts species 8472's bio-ships to the presence of an intruder craft.

It has been postulated that species 8472 was not aware of this dimension until the incursion by the Borg in the early 2370's. The Borg learned of the species possible existence via the assimilation of various civilizations that had been studying the alternate dimension. Using a powerful artificially generated quantum singularity, the Borg invaded fluidic space with the intention of assimilating any life forms that might reside there and their attendant technology.

However, the Borg underestimated the power of Species 8472's biogenic technology, for the first time attacking an enemy with the ability to easily defend itself from Borg technology. Not only did they repel the Borg from fluidic space, they pursued the Borg into their own territory in the delta quadrant.

According to the Borg report we translated, in a period of five months the Borg lost over 300 ships, eight planets and over four million drones to the attacks by species 8472. The Borg desire to assimilate the life form was thwarted by their incredibly dense DNA and other aspects of their advanced physiology that effectively eliminates the possibility of assimilation by typical Borg techniques at least.

In fact, our studies indicate that species 8472 has an immune system that is nothing less than extraordinary. Besides incredibly efficient internal killer cells, the creature can actually project a mild bio-electric force field. Species 8472 is a formidable enemy, for even when severely wounded and barely able to maintain consciousness it's physiology projects an unmeasured bio-electric field that makes it impossible to complete a scan, effectively blocking out all scanner signals.

We have seen situations where a member of species 8472 has displayed several gross bodily injuries from beam weapons and puncture weapons and they still manage to regenerate within a very short period of time.

The internal cell structure of the purple shaded creatures is fascinating, unlike any life form we've encountered before. A cell from one of the creatures will exhibit as many as two thousand mitochondria versus the normal human which has between 2 and 12 similar structures per cell. Further, analysis of the DNA of these life forms displays the most densely coded DNA sequences ever seen. No matter what attacks the creature's systems, whether it be a chemical, biological or energy based agent, the species' immune architectures are able to overcome the invader.

In fact, the immune system of the species goes beyond simply protecting the internal physiology from outside attack. The immune system is so impressive as to actually provide the creature with an effective form of attack.. If a challenger's body is infected with even the smallest amount of the creature' s biological material it rapidly invades every organ in the victim's body and essentially consumes it from within. Fortunately, Star Fleet had a treatment developed very early on, utilizing modified Borg nanoprobes.

Interestingly, the only defense we have against species 8472 is through similarly modified Borg nanoprobes. Regardless of the method of introduction, these specially modified cell sized nanoprobes begin the process of assimilation, but then self-destruct, destroying the alien material along with themselves. This produces an effect on bio-ships that causes them to explode, as it does to the actual entities themselves. We can also adjust the nanoprobes to simply sedate the creature or kill it.

Species 8472 does not appear to have any vocal cords, communicating telepathically with each other and telepathic humanoids like Betazoids, Vulcans and the Kes. In any case the creatures limited communications with humanoids has been very aggressive, emphasizing their bravado and malevolence for our life form, as well as their belief that they are invincible. It appears they view our dimension as an infection, an agent of destruction that they must eradicate.

Members of species 847 display individuality, unlike the Borg collective. To date we have uncovered a hierarchy that exists within the species' society, with individuals that have varied points of view, practice different customs and hold various positions of authority within their social structure. There is no indication of sexual differentiation.

We recently gained additional information about Species 8472 from subspace transmissions of the Hirogen, a nomadic space-faring hunter clan that inhabits a large section of the delta quadrant. According to the data we intercepted, the Hirogen chased a single creature over a region of 50 light years in a six month period as they attempted to hunt it down. They described the creature's ability to survive relentless pursuit and attacks, saying that it appeared like a cat, to have many lives.

In information gleaned from Borg contacts we note that they observed the specific strategies that species 8472 displays upon entering a spacecraft. They proceed to disable the ships primary power grid, then they disable key systems such as life support, gravimetric systems, and so on. As they encounter other life forms they just as methodically eliminate the threat as quickly and efficiently as possible.

Again, much like a severely wounded mammal, species 8472 will barricade itself into a corner, presumably to give itself enough time to sufficiently regenerate from it's traumatic injuries.

Amazingly, there is evidence in the Voyager transmissions that species 8472 can, presumably due to their unique DNA alter their genetic matrix, allowing them to assume the shape and anatomical structure of other species, including humanoid. Since much of the transmission was corrupted in this particular part of the data packeting, we do not have much in the way of detail on this fascinating aspect of species 8472. This also opens up the question as to whether there may already be members of species 8472 living among us as humanoids. The data we did derive indicates that the creatures can only do this trick for short period of time unless they utilize some enzymatic preparation that they must inject into themselves.

In summary, the introduction of the humanoid dominated space to species 8472 has been cause for great concern among the strategists at Star Fleet Command. Any species that can send the Borg running, killing millions of drones, destroying entire planets, yes this is cause for concern. Obviously, if species 8472 can develop a method to fight off the effective our manipulated nanoprobes then we stand, for the moment at least, defenseless against such a technologically advanced and malevolent race.

Since we discovered strong evidence that the humanoid genome was intentionally seeded on planets throughout this galaxy, we are now facing for the first time a species that is completely alien; nothing about them physiologically, psychologically, or neurologically is in the slightest way related to humanoids. Their DNA is over 100 times more densely coded than the humanoid, or any other genome for that matter.

Although the unintentional involvement of Star Fleet in the Borg conflict with species 8472 and it's frighteningly impressive bio-ships has afforded the Federation it's first opportunity to establish peaceable relations with the Borg, the catalyst of this unholy event may be something akin to the devil himself

Access to all data contained herein requires a Level Four, Sigma 6B security clearance and a Need To Know authorization from Star Fleet Command. Failure to follow this directive can result in severe fines and imprisonment

End.