Diagnosans

From Farscape Encyclopedia Project

Diagnosan Planet of origin Unknown Height of average adult 6.0"-7.0" Average length N/A Average wingspan N/A Skin color Pale pinkish gray Hair color None visible Feather color None First Appearance (2.22 "Die Me, Dichotomy") Distinctions Extremely sensitive olfactory senses (smell); Vulnerability to inhaled pathogens, require sterilized air
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[edit] Overview

Diagnosans are an alien race known for their natural ability to detect and treat a variety of diseases in all types of living things.

Due to this, many of them become physicians. They have complex minds and an equally complex language, so much so that standard translator microbes cannot decode the intricacies of their speech. They are soft-spoken and gentle, further adding to their abilities as doctors.

Diagnosans can diagnose disease in many different races, from humans to Leviathans, such as Moya.

Their primary flaw as a species is, ironically, their own inability to tolerate infection in their bodies. Typically, Diagnosans wear special masks whenever they are in a situation where they may come into contact with a contagion (figure 1.1). Usually, they use a sterile force field when performing surgery, but they must put their mask back on before turning off the field, since even traces of a disease can prove fatal if inhaled into their nose and mouth (figure 1.2).

[edit] Trivia

Diagnosans often freeze the bodies of dying patients at the moment before death, in order to use their organs for other patients. Stark became extremely upset after realizing this, since he is a Stykera, and can communicate with dying individuals as they are crossing over.

[edit] Science and Speculation (non-canon)

Diagnosans have great sniffers, i.e. a great sense of smell. The sense of smell in humans, and likely analogously in diagnosans, is produced by microscopic particles that slough off and are released by the objects, substances and organisms in our environment, when they contact the nasal chemoreceptors, nerve cells that detect chemicals. This requires that these particles get to the chemoreceptors. (Figure 1.1) It is likely that diagnosans lack the air filting defenses present in human (an presumably sebacean) anatomy that prevent particles from getting to the chemoreceptors.) The internal surfaces of human nasal passages are covered with hair and microscopic hair-like cilia that trap the bulk of particles entering the nose before they contact the nasal tissues or enter the lungs. This buildup of particles is continually removed by the excretion of mucous from the nasal tissues, the mucus membranes, and drains either out of the nose, (snot), or down the back of the throat to the stomach. While this system protects the human body from the allergens, pollutants, pathogens, and any other foreign materials it also prevents the majority of the billions of particles from the environment that would produce smells. These defenses diminish the human sense of smell.

Some of these particles, those that are small enough, and those that "invade" the nose in great quantities manage to get past these defenses and reach the nasal membranes and the waiting chemoreceptors, if the find one. Humans have a relatively low density of chemoreceptors per square centimeter in their nasal passages than say, a dog or a pig, two animals that rely heavily on their sense of smell. The ancient primate anscestors of humans, (and sebaceans), came to rely on their vision, over smell to aid them in their daily tasks. And, as seems to be the case in evolution, if you don't use it... you lose it. Having less need for their sense of smell, primates were free to develop their nasal filtration systems to reduce disease.

Diagnosans likely have an extremely high density of chemoreceptive cells with little or no defenses preventing particles (or pathogens) to come in contact with them and the nasal tissues, thus their vulnerability to disease and need for protective air filtration systems.

This simultaneous olfactory sensitivity and inhaled pathogenic vunerability suggests that diagnosans evolved in a sterile or "pathogen poor" environment. It is also possible that these physiological circumstances were genetically engineered. Based on the biological expertise seen among Diagnosans, this is a reasonable possibility.