Star Trek: Time Dilation, Explained

Important takeaways

• Star Trek episodes set on time dilation planets explore accelerated evolution or lifetimes of characters.
• Star Trek: Lower Deck's episode “Fully Dilated” introduces the Lower Deckers to time dilation with a classic twist.
• Time dilation on planets occurs due to unique structures or space-time breaks, causing various effects.

Some of the best episodes of Star Trek has told the stories of what happens when Starfleet officers get stuck in places where time moves much faster than on Earth or Starfleet ships. This type of distortion is called time dilation. Episodes that take place on or in the orbit of time dilation planets tend to follow one of two patterns. They either feature familiar characters living an entire life in the accelerated time frame, or the inhabitants of time-warped planets evolve within days as the crew of a Starfleet ship watches.

A recent episode of Star Trek: Lower Decks, “Fully Dilated,” gives some of the Lower Deckers their first experience of time dilation, and they follow the familiar Star Trek pattern. D'Vana Tendi, Beckett Mariner, and T'lyn get stuck living on a time dilation planet for almost a year, despite only being away from Cerritos for a few minutes. Of course, the episode has plenty of classics Lower deck twists and deep cuts, including callbacks to other time-dilated planets in the Trekverse.

What is time dilation and how does it work?

As Lower Deckers quickly explains in “Fully Dilated,” when time speeds up on a planet or in the planet's orbit, it is said to experience “time dilation.” This is a specific type of time differential or space time differential, which is a Treknobabble way of saying that time moves differently than it does in another place. Temporal or space-time differences, including time dilation, can happen for a variety of reasons.

Sometimes they are created by disturbances in the space-time continuum. This happened in Star Trek: Voyager the “Gravity” episode. A sinkhole in subspace created a temporal differential that pulled one of Voyager's shuttlepods to a desert planet, where every minute of time on the planet equaled about half a second outside the temporal differential.

More often, a unique feature of the planet's structure causes the difference in spacetime. In it Voyager episode “Blink of an Eye”, the ship became stuck in the orbit of a planet that Naomi Wildman and Seven of Nine called “The Weird Planet Displaced in Time”. The planet rotated 58 times per minute, so each day on the planet lasted just one second for the Voyager crew. The time dilation on the planet was caused by its unique core, which was made of tachyons, naturally occurring particles that travel faster than the speed of light.

Dilmer III, the planet Tendi, Mariner and T'Lyn visit in “Fully Dilated” also experiences time dilation due to its unique planetary structure. Although the episode does not mention what the planet's core is made of, Lower Deckers mentions that the space-time difference on the planet was created by its core. The time dilation on Dilmer III is not as pronounced as it was on “The Weird Planet Displaced in Time”, but for every second on Cerritos, a week passed on Dilmer III.

Alternate lives lived in moments

The difference in how time works on time dilation planets means that, in what appears to be moments for one life form, life on one planet can evolve from primitive to warp capable, or another life form can live an entire lifetime.

Episode: “Gravity”

In “Gravity”, Lt. Tom Paris, security chief Tuvok, and The Doctor spend months on the planet where their shuttle pod crashed, even though the crew of Voyager thought they were only gone for a few hours. While on the planet, they meet Noss, a humanoid who has lived there for quite some time. She takes them in and teaches them how to survive on the planet. Paris, Tuvok and Noss (the Doctor had to be disabled as much as possible to preserve his holo-emitter) develop deep relationships as they live together on the planet. Over time, Noss fell in love with Tuvok. Although Tuvok, committed to Vulcan logic (and to his Vulcan wife), would never admit it, he also fell in love with her.

When they were finally rescued, Paris and Tuvok had to mourn the lives they had built on the planet and the various relationships they had built with Noss. And they were the only ones who could understand the months they had lived in just the hours since they disappeared.

Episode: “Blink of an Eye”

In “Blink of an Eye”, Voyager is only stuck in the planet's orbit for a few days, but in those few days the life forms on the planet below experience several centuries of evolution. When Voyager first gets stuck in orbit, the humanoids below are in their “caveman” era, worshiping Voyager as a God. Just hours later in Voyager's time, a massive society emerges on the planet.

The next morning on Voyager, the planet's inhabitants have developed advanced technology and are beginning to explore space. Specifically, they want to visit what they eventually identified as the ship in the sky, Voyager. Unfortunately, the space-time warp always prevents them from getting to Voyager.

A couple of days after Voyager arrived in orbit, a spacecraft from the planet finally made it all the way to Voyager. The man from the planet explained that they had developed technology that allowed them to account for the differences between space and time, adding that the dream of visiting Voyager had been passed down through generations of his family. He uses that technology to help Voyager escape from his planet's orbit.

Episode: “Fully Dilated”

When Mariner, Tendi, and T'Lyn realize that something had gone wrong on Cerritos, and they would be on Dilmer III for weeks or maybe months in local time, Mariner sets out to live his own life with time dilation. And as it always goes with lower deck, It doesn't go exactly as she planned. But she makes a lot of good friends during her two stops in prison. The episode is worth watching unspoiled, as fans of Lower deck will find much to enjoy.