Horta Facts and Biology - Janus Hominidae

H is for Horta!

The Horta, introduced in the TOS episode "The Devil in the Dark" and originating on Janus VI, is a fine example of silicon-based life. Just as a human moves through air, the Horta is able to move through rock with incredible ease by secreting an extremely corrosive acid from their bodies. This creates the tunnels in which they reside - and through tunneling, they also gain nourishment from the rock. They may exist for periods of time in an oxygen atmosphere, but they did not evolve in this type of environment.

Illustration by Don Ivan Punchatz

The Horta are, because they are silicon based and not carbon based like most life forms, difficult to detect with tricorders and are invulnerable to type one phasers (they can be injured by an adjusted type two phaser).  Until the Horta was discovered on Janus VI in "the Devil in the Dark", there were no known silicon based life forms (even the Tcha'besheh or A'kweth is largely unknown).

The Horta do not posses any type of technology or weaponry - the acid produced by their bodies is not only for moving through rock, but for self defense as well.

Scanned from "Worlds of the Federation"

Approximately every fifty or sixty thousand years, all but one Horta dies. This lone Horta will then become the mother to thousands of eggs (silicone "nodules"), from which offspring will hatch. The eggs are stored in the "Vault of Tomorrow" in the "Chamber of Ages". It is then up to her to raise the young and protect them, a task which includes passing on the legends and myths of their society's history.

There have, according to many novels by Diane Duane, been Horta on starships such as the Enterprise, and according to the TNG novel "Dyson Sphere", Starfleet has starships entirely operated by Horta. I will go no further into the many appearances of Horta in comics and novels, or games at this time.

"Cellular" structure - Star Fleet Medical Reference Manual

According to the Star Fleet Medical Reference Manual:

"The Horta's internal structure is similar to that of a geode. At it's center lies a molten mass where the eggs develop after having seperated from the block of genetic material that serves as the ovary. Also located at the center is the brain, which is kept at a superheated temperature by the encompassing fluid. Thin veins of flowing magma radiate from the brain and form concentric curcles of nervous tissue in the Horta's plastic-like mesos, or middle layer." 

On the underside of the Horta, are a kind of cilia upon which it moves. Below is a diagram from the same manual, with corresponding labels underneath:

Star Trek Medical Reference Manual

A - Nervous system

B - Central nervous system

C - Mesos

D - Cutis

E - Acid jets

F - Magma duct

G - Protos musculus

H - Flexible mantle

I - Ovary

J - Atrium

K - Ovum

L - Shag