Star Trek The Next Generation
Object

Medical Isolinear Data Chip

A small, rectangular isolinear chip roughly the size of a credit-card segment, layered with dense etched circuitry and a row of gold connector pins along one edge. Scuffed and smudged from handling, the chip emits no light but carries the dull sheen of frequently used spares. A medical crewman presses it into a library console slot; Pulaski studies its readout as the console returns uniformly negative search results.
4 appearances

Purpose

Portable data storage and interface module used to transport diagnostic records or sample metadata and to plug into shipboard consoles for database queries and information retrieval.

Significance

Serves as the pivotal clue that deepens the diagnostic impasse: the chip's negative database return converts a technical mystery into an urgent ethical and tactical dilemma, forcing the crew to abandon destructive options and seek experimental alternatives to save Riker.

Appearances in the Narrative

When this object appears and how it's used

4 moments
S2E11 · Contagion (Star Trek: The Next Generation)
Jury‑Rigged Transporter — 'Energize' into the Unknown

Isolinear chips are the literal spare parts O'Brien uses to rebuild critical circuits; inserted into the console they temporarily restore the energy routing required for transport, making them the small but decisive technical clue enabling the team to proceed.

Before: Scattered and scuffed near the transporter, removed from other housings and available as emergency spares.
After: Inserted into the console as part of the temporary repair, carrying the stress of active power flow and risk of failure.
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S2E11 · Contagion (Star Trek: The Next Generation)
Romulan Arrival and System Collapse — Tactical Dilemma

Isolinear transporter spares are not explicitly described in this moment but are implicated by O'Brien's successful 'Transport complete' report and earlier jury‑rigging context; they undergird the transporter's precarious functioning that allows the away team to be downed yet vulnerable to disrupted recall.

Before: Installed or available in transporter systems as part of prior engineering fixes; supporting a completed transport.
After: Still present but their jury‑rigged nature implies reduced reliability should transport locks be reinitiated under fluctuating shields.
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S2E11 · Contagion (Star Trek: The Next Generation)
Lock Lost, Lock Reclaimed — Emergency Transport from Romulan Ship

Transporter hardware (represented by spare isolinear chip components) underlies the emergency: O'Brien's hands engage the transporter's control array, relying on patched circuitry and system redundancies to re-acquire a failing lock and transmit the subject despite instability.

Before: Installed in the transporter racks as jury-rigged spare patches and actively sustaining a fragile transport lock under emergency conditions.
After: Still in active use sustaining the transport; operational but stressed and implicitly vulnerable to failure, leaving the recovery only tentatively secure.
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S2E22 · Shades of Gray
Diagnostic Impasse

The Medical Isolinear Data Chip is handed to Pulaski and inserted into the library console; it serves as the trigger for the diagnostic search whose uniformly negative results crystallize the crisis and eliminate straightforward technical cures.

Before: In the possession of a medical crewman, carried as a potential source of diagnostic data.
After: Inserted into Pulaski's office library console and read by the system; remains in the console during the immediate reporting of results.
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