100K-Class Centraframe

From Known Universes Wiki

100K-Class Centraframes are a common type of worldlike (or arcology) featuring a rotating cylinder with a length and/or diameter exceeding 100 kilometers. The total size of such a station depends on its method of construction. This kind of space station has been common since ancient times, with examples across the Cosmos.

A Centraframe is any structure made to provide artificial gravity via rotation. Primarily, such structures are used as self-contained and sometimes self-sufficient habitats. Centraframes are made of exotic materials under incredible stresses, making them highly valuable. Because of this, large Centraframes are rarely abandoned or left unoccupied for long. Even in times of war, invading forces tend to occupy and utilize these stations rather than destroy them. As a result, the oldest surviving Centraframes are more than a million years old.

With their universal dissemination and near-universal desirability, many species (including Humans) are more numerous on Centraframe interiors than on planetary surfaces.

Design and Construction

The immensity of 100k-Class stations ensures the environment within has enough mass to remain stable with no control systems, as long as a similar amount of average energy is delivered to the interior and a sufficient ecology is present to prevent runaway climate change. Most Centraframe-based stations can adjust their energy delivery for the conditions present in orbit. This means Centraframe ecologies can survive some cosmological events that planetary ecologies cannot.

Examples

  • Mobile Arco Atsuvan, maintained by Oamadh Cataphracti 491. Main habitat cylinder is 260km long with a diameter of 60km. Atsuvan's Centraframe was spun sometime before 726,500 AA.