Nuclear fission reactor

A nuclear fission reactor is a power source common to 20th and 21st century Earth vehicles. As the name implies, it generates energy through the process of nuclear fission.

The USS Enterprise (CVN-65), an aircraft carrier which was in service with the US Navy, was the first ship of that type to be equipped with such a nuclear reactor. In 1986, Commanders Pavel Chekov and Uhura transported aboard the Enterprise in search of high-energy photons from one of its eight nuclear fission reactors. They were needed to recrystallize the dilithium of the HMS Bounty, a hijacked Klingon Bird-of-Prey taken to the past in order to bring a humpback whale into the future. Captain Montgomery Scott had designed a special device to retrieve the photons, which Chekov and Uhura attached directly to the reactor.