Is it Possible to Slow Down or Stop Borg Nanoprobes?

[Janeway_74656]

I've been watching Voyager lately and was curious if there was any way to slow down or stop Borg nanoprobes once they've been injected into a life form (Species 5618, in this case).

After brainstorming, I've headcanoned possible solutions:

• Nanoprobes that have been reprogrammed to combat Borg nanoprobes
• An EMP (electromagnetic pulse) on the microscopic level?
  
• Temporarily putting the victim in cryogenic stasis as a temporary solution, until a permanent one can be found.

I know, the EMP thing is probably the most unlikely of these. But what do y'all think?

 

[F. King Daniel]

Radiation kills them as per ENT: "Regeneration". Only problem is, is requires so much radiation that only a Denobulan can survive it.

 

[Gary Mitchell]

Use a polaron emitter coupled with a multiphase transducer to cause a variance with the harmonic neutrino field. Just something I overheard once.

 

[1001001]

Use a polaron emitter coupled with a multiphase transducer to cause a variance with the harmonic neutrino field. Just something I overheard once.

Are you mad? You can't just dump that much energy into a transducer!

You have to shunt the flow through the main deflector dish.

Fucking amateurs….

 

[Kor]

And don't forget to reverse the polarity.

If you need assistance with this, Data can do that by "attenuating his axial servo." Of course, that's assuming it's fully functional.

Kor

 

[Janeway_74656]

Are any of the solutions that I headcanoned believable? Would they work in practice?

 

[Gary Mitchell]

They would have to be some pretty tough nanoprobes to resist the Borg tech.

 

[Janeway_74656]

But if they were borrowed from Seven of Nine and reprogrammed, wouldn't they be able to since they were (formerly, at this point) Borg tech?

 

[Timo]

I'd think anything coming from the Borg would be proofed against tampering by the Borg first and foremost. After all, the Collective is a slave society, its citizens its own worst enemies. Reprogramming would no doubt be hellishly difficult if even these members of a cybernetic species cannot do it.

We know assimilation can be slowed down, as per the examples of Picard and Phlox. We have no reason to think the nanoprobes can be evicted for good, though: Picard relapsed into being at least partially Borg (acquiring a subspace hotline in ST:FC), and for all we know Phlox either died in the false knowledge that he was free, or then had to be killed when it turned out he was not...

We also know how Phlox did the slowing down, as described above. We don't know exactly how Crusher thought she had slowed it down on Picard - all we know is that she removed the macroscopic machinery that had been installed in and on him. But she must have been aware of the nanoprobes, too, as we in two episodes learn nanites are standard UFP tech that the Doctor herself is considering as a solution to the problem at hand. So probably she sprayed Picard's nanoprobes with some sort of an anticybernetic, too, falsely thinking this would stop him from having the innate potential for hooking up to the Collective.

Timo Saloniemi

 

[Shawnster]

We don't know exactly how Crusher thought she had slowed it down on Picard - all we know is that she removed the macroscopic machinery that had been installed in and on him. But she must have been aware of the nanoprobes, too, as we in two episodes learn nanites are standard UFP tech that the Doctor herself is considering as a solution to the problem at hand.

Even before that we learned about nanites. Wesley was playing with nanties in the season 3 opener "Evolution."

 

[JirinPanthosa]

Did the Evolution nanites go back in time and become the Borg?

Would be so cool if the Borg were Wesley’s fault.

 

[Tim Thomason]

• An EMP (electromagnetic pulse) on the microscopic level?

I'm no doctor, but I imagine that a microscopic EMP wouldn't be good for your nervous system.

 

[CommanderTrip]

I think it's possible to reconfigure borg nanoprobes to self terminate, but only by sending a resonance pulse using the main deflector dish. Of course, one must first adjust the heseinberg compensators to function more like salamanca transducers, which will in turn cause an cascade overload within the Ehrmentrout processor, thereby completely disabling the Fring circuitry.



Fun aside, to address the OP, I think it might be possible to combat borg nanoprobes with borg nanoprobes. Unsure about the EMP method as I'm sure there are ways to shield from an EMP, and the borg have energy shielding to "adapt" to energy weapons, so why not EMP shielding? Ditto for the cryogenic freeze method. Borg tech seems to be able to survive in arctic environments, albeit in a dormant state. So while the cold may cause assimilated drones to "hibernate", I'm not sure it would necessarily stop the assimilation process completely.

Also, who knows if the borg could eventually adapt to function in cold environments. They didn't seem to be affected by the cold vacuum of space when modifying the Enterprise E deflector dish in First Contact.

 

[Mr. Laser Beam]

Of course, one must first adjust the heseinberg compensators to function more like salamanca transducers, which will in turn cause an cascade overload within the Ehrmentrout processor, thereby completely disabling the Fring circuitry.

Los Pollos Borgmanos?

 

[bolak]

I'm no doctor, but I imagine that a microscopic EMP wouldn't be good for your nervous system.

There were Cold War studies that determined that even the most energetic EMP wouldn't cause noticeable damage to humans. The nervous system is indeed electrical but is well insulated and signalling works on much longer timescales than EMP; it's more like an old tube radio!

What might not be so good would be millions of fried nanites floating around the body afterwards.


I hate Transporter Solutions (TM) but if you subscribe to that magic technology then presumably one could also be shunted through the buffer and have any non-organic elements removed. Since nanites are billions of times larger than quarks. Not useful for Picard or Geordi though...

 

[cosmic mouse]

Temporarily putting the victim in cryogenic stasis as a temporary solution, until a permanent one can be found.

This was my first thought, since the Borg are apparently susceptible to cold temps...

...or maybe modified omicron particles that were delivered via targeted injection into a nanoprobe, or for that matter a lethal viral vector injected that targeted nanoprobes specifically. Perhaps acquiring and altering the nanoprobe virus created in Dark Frontier??

 

[Velocity]

Are nanites different from nanoprobes or are they the same thing? Could Wesley's nanites fight and defeat Borg nanoprobes?

 

[Shawnster]

Are nanites different from nanoprobes or are they the same thing? Could Wesley's nanites fight and defeat Borg nanoprobes?

Why would they need to be different for this idea to work? Seems like nanoprobes could fight each other if told to.

 

[Velocity]

I think you misunderstood my post. I was asking about nanites because I don't remember what their capabilities are because it's been a LONG time since I watched that episode, and I don't know whether they are the same as Borg nanoprobes, (maybe another term to describe the same thing) or if they have different properties. Seems that I remember that the nanites had or developed little minds of their own and I don't remember if the Borg nanoprobes had that ability.

 

[The Wormhole]

Could Wesley's nanites fight and defeat Borg nanoprobes?

That's discussed in TBOBW. The consensus is probably, but it would take too long to save the Federation.