A wall was an upright structure used by architects and shipbuilders for defining an area and carrying a load. A wall could be for security, shelter, soundproofing, or, simply, for decoration. Walls were made from many different kinds of material. A unique wall was the transparency which was made of a transparent material, making it a kind of wall-window.
Governments sometimes regulated the arrangement of structures within their spheres of influence, sometimes imposing restrictions on where walls and doors could be. (DS9: "Dax") The location of walls within structures contributed to the aesthetic or working arrangement of the building. Benjamin Sisko believed that a kitchen should be kept separate from the rest of the house to enhance concentration, while Kasidy Yates-Sisko thought walling off the kitchen was isolating. (DS9: "Penumbra")
Walls were important to ancient fortifications like Earth's Alamo, which also featured palisades. In 1836, during the Battle of the Alamo, the Mexican Army, under the command of Antonio López de Santa Anna, came over the north wall of the Alamo and defeated the defenders of the Alamo. (DS9: "The Changing Face of Evil") The holographic recreation of World War II Sainte Claire featured a Nazi compound that could be breached via a storm window on the eastern wall. (VOY: "The Killing Game") The Great Wall of China was finished by the first Qin emperor with the intention of preventing an invasion from the nomads to the north. It was said to have been so large that it could be seen from the planet's orbit. (VOY: "11:59") The Walls of Jericho were notable for having fallen. (TNG: "The Perfect Mate") The ancient city of Quin'lat on Qo'noS had walls, which also provided protection against a great storm to those that sheltered inside. (TNG: "Rightful Heir")
Law enforcement officers could demand individuals stand or sit against nearby walls to contain them or maintain order in chaotic situations. (DS9: "Past Tense, Part I", "Past Tense, Part II", VOY: "Alliances") War criminals might be lined up against a wall for execution. (DS9: "Waltz", VOY: "The Killing Game, Part II")
Walls could be used to display artwork or trophies. Klingons, for example, would have their enemies' heads stuffed and mounted in their quarters. (TOS: "Obsession") The Kazon decorated their walls with the clothing of their enemies. (VOY: "Initiations") Paintings were often displayed on walls; or other objects of importance, such as the letter Jake Sisko's publisher sent him accepting his first novel, or holo-images of important events. (PIC: "Remembrance", DS9: "The Visitor", "A Time to Stand") Walls were sometimes decorated with paper. (DS9: "Badda-Bing, Badda-Bang")
Force field walls could repel dust with the strength of a faint electrostatic charge. (DS9: "The Sword of Kahless")
In the USS Enterprise, the phasers may have been able to cut through the walls. Some doors could be opened by cutting through the wall circuits adjacent to the door even if the mechanism was locked off. Walls inside the quarters and along some of the corridors had communicators in them which had the capability to record what was said. (TOS: "Wink of an Eye", "The Naked Time", "The Conscience of the King")
The walls of the USS Enterprise's turbolift could be removed to diagnose problems. (DS9: "Trials and Tribble-ations")
The subspace transmitter on Danube-class shuttlecrafts was located inside one of the walls and could be removed, though not necessarily as part of its design. (DS9: "The Ascent")
The walls of the Galaxy-class starships were made of tritanium. Replicators were mounted in walls, and the doors could open automatically when someone walked near them. There were also energy conduits within the walls, and polyduranide in the bulkheads. The walls of the turboshaft were equipped with ladders to allow movement within the shaft in the case the turbolift was unoperative. (TNG: "Where Silence Has Lease", "Up The Long Ladder", "Who Watches The Watchers", "Disaster", "Eye of the Beholder")
The interior walls of the Defiant-class starships were not very well insulated. (DS9: "Starship Down")
The walls of Intrepid-class starships held fluid conduits that conducted sound very well. This enabled the residents of adjoining quarters to hear their neighbors. (VOY: "The Thaw")
In recounting the battle between Koloth, Kor, Kang, and the forces of T'nag; Kor described the three's journey through a smoldering canyon: "Walls of fire on one side, rivers of lava on the other." (DS9: "The Sword of Kahless")
By 2382, wall comms were unusual to find in Starfleet ships or starbases. (LD: "Starbase 80?!")
Borg ships had compartments in the walls that housed two Borg each. (TNG: "Q Who")
The warp core had a reactor wall. If it got too hot, increasing intake of liquid helium could cool it. (TNG: "The Nth Degree")
In the 23rd century, intra-ship beaming (transporting from one section of the ship to another) was possible, but rarely done due to the danger. Pinpoint accuracy was required, as rematerializing in a solid object, deck, or wall was deadly. (TOS: "Day of the Dove") By the 24th century, near-warp transport was possible, but could have unusual effects. For example, the individual being transported might perceive being "stuck" in a wall before the transport completed. (TNG: "The Schizoid Man") In 2375, a micro-transporter was used to beam a bullet with its motion preserved to the other side of a wall, where it could hit its target, thereby firing "through" the wall. (DS9: "Field of Fire")
Holodeck technology obscured the locations of the walls by projecting images of more distant perspectives, allowing the room to feel much larger than it was. One could, however, reveal the wall by personally touching it or by throwing an object at a location that did not appear to be a wall, such as a space between two trees. (TNG: "Encounter at Farpoint", "Elementary, Dear Data", DS9: "Afterimage", VOY: "Projections")
Walls could be used as cover against an explosion or other attack. (TOS: "A Taste of Armageddon")
Cells, the most basic unit of biology, had a structure protecting the rest of the cell components called a cell wall. Low cell wall integrity could make transmission of infectious agents impossible. Several billion years ago, the cell wall was breached by an ancestor of the mitochondria, leading to subsequent generations housing the organelle. (TNG: "Identity Crisis", VOY: "Once Upon a Time")
Caves could be formed by water or by volcanic activity. If the walls were dry, it might be an indication of the cave being formed by lava flows. (TNG: "Final Mission")
The allegorical Tamarian language had the phrase, "Shaka, when the walls fell," indicating a failure. (TNG: "Darmok")
As a method of intimidation or organization, individuals could be asked or instructed to line up against a wall. (TOS: "Patterns of Force")
"White walls" were a type of tire in the 20th century on Earth wherein the entirety or portion of the sidewall was made of white rubber instead of the uniform black. (TNG: "Clues")
To "hit a wall" was sometimes used as a metaphor for a limit or boundary impeding access or separating two things, such as a "file wall" or a miscommunication or estrangement between two people. This metaphor was also used to indicate an impassable mental challenge. (TNG: "Conundrum", "The Icarus Factor", "The Perfect Mate", "Attached", DS9: "Inquisition", "The Sound of Her Voice", VOY: "Threshold", "Nothing Human", PIC: "Monsters")"Climbing the walls" was an idiom to indicate someone had an excessive amount of energy, sometimes as an effect of drugs. It might also indicate a feeling of claustrophobia. (TOS: "By Any Other Name", DS9: "Captive Pursuit") "Putting it to the wall" was another idiom that indicated the pilot of a vehicle to go as fast as possible. (TNG: "Time Squared") To feel as if one's "back was to the wall" was to feel as if they were trapped. (TNG: "The Wounded") To be a "fly on the wall" was to watch proceedings silently as if the viewer were not there. (TNG: "A Matter Of Time", "Lower Decks") To "nail [someone] to the wall" meant to exact the most harsh punishment available by law. (DS9: "Business as Usual")
Noonien Soong theorized that Humans valued old things like churches, walls, and antiques because they desired a sense of continuity to give their lives purpose. (TNG: "Brothers")
The Akritirian maximum security detention facility featured solid walls in all directions. (VOY: "The Chute")
The people of Amerind had a legend which foretold the appearance of a god from the walls of their temple. (TOS: "The Paradise Syndrome")
The walls of the complex on Arret were unfamiliar to Commander Spock. However, they were much stronger and harder than anything he'd measured. (TOS: "Return to Tomorrow")
The ruins of B'hala on Bajor were found by Benjamin Sisko in a cavern behind a stone wall. As the city was excavated, ranjens located the walls of ruins beneath the city that were at least ten-thousand years older. (DS9: "Rapture")
The home of Tekeny Ghemor on Cardassia Prime had a contact wire between the walls and access plates that would trip a silent alarm when severed. (DS9: "Second Skin")
Humans and Ktarian shared the biological feature of a uterine wall. A rare complication of such hybrid pregnancies was the infant's exo-cranial ridges becoming lodged there after shifting positions. (VOY: "Deadlock")
The Caretaker hid the data processing system behind a holographic wall on his array. (VOY: "Caretaker")
Some of Deep Space 9's wall panels could be removed, revealing potential hiding spots for small objects. (DS9: "Necessary Evil") Inside the chute leading to the station's ore processing center, a small access port in one of the walls would open the hatch leading into the processing center. (DS9: "Civil Defense")
On Deneb IV, the tunnels beneath Farpoint Station were comprised of an unknown substance that Geordi La Forge had never seen before. (TNG: "Encounter at Farpoint")
On Earth, a 20th century periodical was the Wall Street Journal , named for a street named for its adjacency to an old wall. That street was later regarded by Ferengi with reverence due to its use as a financial center in the 19th, 20th, and part of the 21st century. (TNG: "The Neutral Zone", VOY: "11:59") The Graystone Hotel in Chicago had wall-to-wall Italian marble in 1928. (VOY: "Course: Oblivion") The Earth children's rhyme Humpty Dumpty featured the titular Humpty Dumpty sitting on a wall until it fell off it. (TNG: "The Masterpiece Society") From 2022 to September 2024, a portion of San Francisco was walled off and designated Sanctuary District A. This district contained approximately ten thousand of the city's homeless and jobless population. (DS9: "Past Tense, Part I")
In an alternate reality, Benny Russell wrote his story about Captain Benjamin Sisko on the walls of his padded cell. His doctor Wykoff noted that people who were "fine" didn't write on walls. (DS9: "Shadows and Symbols")
Hortas could cut through walls to create tunnels in such a way that they would become hot. They might also use this ability to interfere with the structural integrity of adjacent cave walls. (TOS: "The Devil in the Dark")
The Dominion's Internment Camp 371 was located on an asteroid they previously mined for ultritium. The facility had no dome, but had several barracks, each of which was fitted with its own life support system in the walls. The interior of the walls could be access by removing panels. (DS9: "In Purgatory's Shadow", "By Inferno's Light")
The walls of the Garan mining facility were made of granite with a mixture of pyroclastic infusions. (VOY: "Macrocosm")
Kelvans were creatures of space, and therefore did not appreciate the openness of planets. They preferred the constrictiveness of walls, considering them safe and comforting. (TOS: "By Any Other Name")
Part of the Legaran protocol involved bare walls of a muted tone. (TNG: "Sarek")
Makull's homeworld used volatile polaric ion energy to power their civilization. The conduit walls that transported this energy could be breached by subspace fractures. (VOY: "Time and Again")
Some caves on Melona IV had monocaladium particulates in the walls. (TNG: "Silicon Avatar")
The Human colony in the Orellius system included walls to protect the inhabitants from the wilderness. (DS9: "Paradise")
There was starithium ore in the walls of some caverns on Risa. (TNG: "Captain's Holiday")
On Rubicun III, forbidden areas were cordoned off with white walls or fences. Entering these zones was punishable by death. (TNG: "Justice")
The Sakari planet was subject to earthquakes that made the walls of its caverns unstable. (VOY: "Blood Fever")
When the planet Sarpeidon was about to be destroyed by the supernova of its star, the inhabitants created a time portal to escape destruction. Some of these portals were located in walls. (TOS: "All Our Yesterdays")
On Secarus IV, The Albino's compound had several walls, some of which separated the main house from the rest of the grounds. (DS9: "Blood Oath")
The Turkana IV colony fusion sources were located underground, and the source that powered defense systems could be access by entry points evenly spaced in the walls of the chamber below every twenty five meters. (TNG: "Legacy")
The walls of the Council Chambers on Organia were very thick. (TOS: "Errand of Mercy")
On Capella IV, outside Capellan territory was a canyon that was difficult to escape. The walls of the canyon got progressively higher and narrower. (TOS: "Friday's Child")
When Captain James T. Kirk and the crew traveled to the year 1986, Montgomery Scott visited Plexicorp to obtain a plexiglass wall that could withstand the pressure of 18,000 cubic feet of water. The technology currently available at that time meant the wall would need to be six inches thick. Since the Scott required a thinner wall, he offered to show the plant's head, Nichols, how to manufacture a wall that would only be one inch thick. (Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home)
On Talos IV, the Talosians built their cells with transparencies. In 2254, when he was a captive, Captain Christopher Pike tested the strength of the transparency by throwing himself against it. (TOS: "The Cage")
While studying the plasma geyser on Melnos IV, Nella Daren and a team of geologists used interconnected thermal deflector units to protect themselves from the heat. When she recalled the measure in 2367, Geordi La Forge referred to their makeshift device as a "firewall." (TNG: "Lessons")
The biosphere of Moab IV had a wall beyond which it was impossible to see. (TNG: "The Masterpiece Society")
The walls of Species 8472 bio-ships could regenerate themselves when damaged. (VOY: "Scorpion")
The Vidiians had technology capable of creating false walls to hide themselves and their organ storage facilities. (VOY: "Phage", "Faces")
Racquetball was a game that involved two or four players hitting a ball off the walls of the court. The game also included maneuvers named for which wall and section of the wall the ball ricocheted from, such as the "back wall riser shot." (DS9: "Rivals")
The walls of the Carraya IV prison camp separated the inhabitants from the jungle, but could be scaled. (TNG: "Birthright, Part II")
Nitrium parasites had the capacity to eat through the walls of a Galaxy class starship. (TNG: "Cost Of Living")
Exocomps had the ability to detect micro-fractures in the conduit walls where they performed maintenance. (TNG: "The Quality of Life")
Locator bombs were known to have such explosive force that recovering the victim of such assassination attempts involved "scraping [them] off the walls." (DS9: "The Nagus")
One of the environments in the Wadi game Chula featured a cavern with weakened walls and shifting tectonic plates. (DS9: "Move Along Home")
Without a mobile emitter, the Emergency Medical Holographic program was confined within the walls of Sickbay (or other rooms with holographic projectors. Despite often characterizing the situation as incarceration, The Doctor considered the space within those walls on the Voyager his home. (VOY: "Concerning Flight", "One")
Ro Laren once remarked the walls of the USS Intrepid were "a little thin." (PIC: "Imposters")
Tom Paris observed that inertial dampers prevented a ship's crew from becoming "stains on the back wall" when going to warp. (VOY: "Tattoo")
The Leonardo da Vinci hologram mused that he could be transfixed by candlelight on walls, and other mundane sights and sounds, as a way of focusing his mind. (VOY: "Scorpion")
When the USS Voyager crew was displaced to 1996, they discovered force field technology from the 29th century that prevented scanning. (VOY: "Future's End")
In 2365, Nagilum created an illusion of the USS Yamato. The materials of its walls appeared to be beyond that of 24th century Federation ships. (TNG: "Where Silence Has Lease")
Later that year, Geordi La Forge characterized Sonya Gomez' frenetic energy and clumsiness as "banging into walls," warning that she wouldn't last long if she didn't relax. (TNG: "Q Who")
When Geordi La Forge and Ro Laren were affected by the Romulan molecular phase inverter in 2368, they were able to pass through walls, people, and other objects. La Forge attempted to communicate with Data by leaving a trail of chronitons behind in the walls and panels he passed through. (TNG: "The Next Phase")
Sometime prior to 2369, the Devidians modified the walls of a cavern near San Francisco with the intent of focusing a temporal distortion to allow them to travel back to 1893. (TNG: "Time's Arrow")
When recalling the experience of her death in 2369, Kai Opaka described a "wall of heat" passing through her, followed by nothing. (DS9: "Battle Lines")
Later that year, Quark had to fix the walls of his holosuites when Klingons visited. (DS9: "Dramatis Personae")
When Jean-Luc Picard fought a group of aliens in 2370, he was thrown against the wall. (TNG: "Gambit, Part I")
Also that year, Vaatrik Pallra asked Quark to retrieve a strong box her husband hid behind the wall panels in their shop on Deep Space 9. (DS9: "Necessary Evil")
Later that year, Doctor Pran Tainer was injured on Atrea IV when a wall gave way while his team was checking the units for ferro-plasmic infusion. (TNG: "Inheritance")
When Odo was ill that year, he escaped by climbing up walls and hiding in conduits. (DS9: "The Alternate")
In 2371, the Romulans Ruwon and Karina attempted to destroy Deep Space 9 by transporting a quantum singularity behind one of the station's walls. (DS9: "Visionary")
Later that year, a rupture in the power conduit behind a wall in Elim Garak's tailor shop caused an explosion. (DS9: "Improbable Cause")
Also that year, the USS Voyager attempted to hide from a Vidiian ship inside a hollow asteroid. The chamber emanated severe electro-magnetic interference that prevented direct scanning, but the reflective nature of the walls allowed them to use the directed energy of the ship's phasers to locate the Vidiian ship that followed them. (VOY: "Phage")
Later that year, the Voyager encountered an inversion field that caused everything on the ship from the walls to the atmosphere to enter a state of structural flux. (VOY: "Twisted")
In 2372, a deputy on Deep Space 9 caught Ojuy Gel putting political graffiti on the walls of Section Four. (DS9: "Crossfire")
Later that year, playing Springball, Kira Nerys tricked her opponent by giving a tiny head fake, and then checked him into the wall. (DS9: "For the Cause")
When a Dominion starship crashed on Torga IV, it was damaged such that a Vorta control console was lodged in one of the walls in an upper compartment. (DS9: "The Ship")
Clem the anaphasic lifeform possessed much of the crew of the USS Cerritos in 2382, causing them to lick the walls. (LD: "Starbase 80?!")