Surely, they can just un-replicate it and replenish the replicator protein stocks.
Edit: Thinking about this problem some more, there’s probably a serious issue figuring out what fluids and tissues are safe to un-replicate.
Per the technical manual, the personnel transporters have quark-scale resolution, but the cargo transporters and replicators only have molecular-scale resolution. It would be a gross safety violation to put a living being through anything short of a personnel-rated transporter. Meanwhile any kind of bodily fluid that is emitted is going to have a bunch of still living cells, at least for a while. (I’m not even discussing the gametes here yet). So how do you get the computer to safely and reliably make the determination?
I’m sure I recall them using the cargo transporter at least a few times, but it might be enterprise I’m thinking of? I wonder what resolution they had…
On Lower Decks one of the worst tasks you could be assigned to is cleaning out the jizz traps on the holodeck.
Surely, they can just un-replicate it and replenish the replicator protein stocks.
Edit: Thinking about this problem some more, there’s probably a serious issue figuring out what fluids and tissues are safe to un-replicate.
Per the technical manual, the personnel transporters have quark-scale resolution, but the cargo transporters and replicators only have molecular-scale resolution. It would be a gross safety violation to put a living being through anything short of a personnel-rated transporter. Meanwhile any kind of bodily fluid that is emitted is going to have a bunch of still living cells, at least for a while. (I’m not even discussing the gametes here yet). So how do you get the computer to safely and reliably make the determination?
I mean, if the ship is truly self sufficient for long journeys, then this is exactly what they’ve already been doing.
I’m sure I recall them using the cargo transporter at least a few times, but it might be enterprise I’m thinking of? I wonder what resolution they had…
No, that does sound familiar from TNG. I’m sure I remember it too.
“I’m not trying to replicate babies anymore.” - The Improvised Star Trek
Freeman: “People use it for that?”
Ransom: “Yeah, it’s mostly that.”