Morphing
Theory:
A Scientific Look at the Power
This page was inspired by the morphing theories
on Chee-Dolus's page, and I have to give credit to him to thinking up such a neat idea. At
first I just read the theories didn't think much about them until we started a genetics
unit in my Biology class. I also did a little research on the subject in order to come up
with a way that the Andalite morphing technology could actually be accomplished. Of course
it's all speculation and could never be tested, but you must keep in mind that this would
be invented by a race who thinks of nuclear power the way we think of electricity and
travels through Z-space like we travel through air. If you find any faults with my theory,
scientifically speaking, you're welcome to comment on them. My theory goes as follows:
The morphing technology is obviously not a single machine, but a vast network of probably
thousands of microbionic units. These units, of course, are contained in the Escafil
device, which is probably the central computer for the smaller morphing units. However
it's obvious that once the morphing ability is aquired, the Escafil device is no longer
needed for it to function. This has been demonstrated by the fact that the Animorphs'
device has been lost and taken away or hidden several times, and the device Ax got his
power from is light years away, yet all of them have been able to function fine,
disregarding mood swings and allergies.
It is also important to note that the Escafil device and the morphing power involve two
different yet interconnected processes: One is the conversion of one animal's DNA into
another. To morph, for example, a wolf, every cell in the Animorphs' body must
convert to a cell of a wolf. The other involves simply rearraning matter, probably in
Z-space. This was demonstrated in two instances. One was the fact that the Helmacrons were
able to draw "transforming power" from the Escafil device which they used to
shrink living things instead of converting their DNA, and many others have theorized that
massive shrinking with retained perportions would be accomplished by concensing the actual
molocules and atoms; there's a lot of empty space in something complex like a human body.
The other was that, when Cassie was trapped in catterpilar morph, and eventually went into
pupa and emerged as an adult at an excellerated rate. The process of changing (when a
catterpillar enters its cocoon, it uses enzymes to break itself down and rearrange its
body into its adult form) reset the morphing clock, which means that the natural
metamorphesis of an insect is a process similar enough to morphing that it actually works
on the technology.
More on that later. First, the issue of nothlits: why is it that staying in a morph
for more than two hours traps one in it permanently? My theory goes that after the body is
converted to another organizim's DNA, it still retains the properties of the real person,
which as we learned in #18 are preserved in Z-space. In fact, Z-space is where the mind
goes, which makes sense because many morphs are too small to hold a human brain and all
the cells it takes. The thought-speak ability gained by the Animorphs when they are in
morph is because of this remote connection. Anyway, these properties gradually
deteriorate, starting from the time a person is in morph. Over the minutes, the real
person in Z-space looses their original charactaristics of human, or Andalite, which ever
the case may be. By two hours, the process has gone so far that it cannot be reversed by
morphing. Morphing has become impossible. The mind-link is still there, though, or else
the nothlit would find themselves trapped in Z-space and their former body an ordinary
wild animal back in real-space.
But what is it that actually accomplishes the morphing process? Obviously it must involve
microscopic agents, since it can be absorbed into the body through the skin by touching
the Escafil device, and the DNA of the animal is also aquired by touch. I think that it is
probably some sort of pseudo-virus which is sophisticated enough to be on the morpher's
skin and, when it makes contact with another animal and the thought-controlled
"aquire" sequence is initiated, takes a sample of the creature's DNA (which can
be taken from a single cell, any cell) and relays the code to all the other units in the
morpher's body. Various clues and references have lead us to beleive that they are located
in the blood. Whether they are floating around in there alongside the blood cells (K.A.
said it was impossible to locate them in a normal blood test, which may or may not rule
that out) or may actually be bonded with the morpher's DNA. This is not likely though,
since the morphing power does not have an effect on one's genetics, as we can see from the
Andalites. If it did, the first Andalite generation to have the morphing power would
differ sligthly from their children.
Which brings us to the morphing itself. As I've mentioned earlier, the morphing machines
are thought-controlled. One must concentrate and think about the animal one wants to morph
before being able to do it, strong emotions can interfere with the morphing, and having a
love for and being very concious of the animals gives one expertice in morphing, Cassie
being a good example. You also might wonder why I refered to the morphing units as
pseudo-viruses. Well, as you should know, viruses exhibit all the qualities of life except
for one: they can't reproduce on their own. They have to use a host cell to do the job.
Since a virus is nothing but a protien shell with genetic material inside, to transform a
cell into a virus-making factory, they latch onto a cell, and inject their genetic
material inside (DNA or RNA, definetly DNA in this case).
This DNA has the programming to "hijak" the cell's nucleus and re-program it to
make viruses. After a while, either the cell explodes from all the viruses, who go on to
invade other cells, or the virus's DNA bonds with the cell's own DNA and remains dormant
until something activates it and it becomes active again, turning the cell into a
virus-making factory. A similar process could be used to change the morpher's native cells
into the cells of whatever creature they're morphing. This means that for every cell of
every species the morpher is capable of morphing, there is a pseudo-virus with the correct
genetic material to make it. Which opens up the possibility that maybe there is a dormant
horse, wolf, etc. inside every cell of Cassie's. But most likely there is a central unit
for each creature the morpher has aquired, a cell-sized machanisim. In this mechanisim are
every kind of pseudo-virus needed to make the new animal. The reason I'm going on about
viruses is that, 1) we were studying viruses in bio and how they work and I actually sat
up and thought "Wait a minute, that works a little like the morphing technology. And
2) not long after developing the morphing technology, the Andalites made contact with the
Arns and used their biology knowlege to create the quantum virus, which also probably have
microscopic units and also probably have Z-space relations. The quantum virus is the next
step up from the morphing technolgy, except morphing units are constructive, while the QV
is destructive.
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