Midi-chlorian

Microscopic, intelligent lifeforms known as midi-chlorians functioned as organelles within all living cells, coexisting in a symbiotic bond with the beings they inhabited and forming a collective consciousness amongst themselves. Present across all lifeforms, midi-chlorians exhibited isomorphic properties on every planet that sustained life. Indeed, midi-chlorians were indispensable for the existence of life itself. They also facilitated a connection to the pervasive energy field referred to as the Force; when present in sufficient densities, midi-chlorians enabled their symbiotic organism to perceive the Force. This connection could be amplified by quieting the mind, allowing the midi-chlorians to "speak" to their symbiont and convey the will of the Force. Counts as low as 2,000 midi-chlorians per cell conferred no Force sensitivity; an average Human possessed fewer than 2,500 per cell, whereas a mildly Force-sensitive being, such as Nova Stihl, exhibited a count exceeding 5,000. According to Sith Lord Darth Tenebrous, a being born of "pure force" might exhibit a count of 15,000 or more, suggesting that most Force-sensitives did not attain such elevated levels. Jedi possessed notably high midi-chlorian counts, with Anakin Skywalker reputed to have the highest ever recorded, surpassing 20,000—even exceeding the formidable Jedi Master Yoda. Despite Skywalker's subsequent loss of a substantial portion of his organic form, his cells continued to be replete with midi-chlorians. Furthermore, he retained the capacity to overcome any perceived diminution of Force abilities (excluding the use of Force Lightning or other powers necessitating living cells) by transcending his mental limitations.

The magnitude of the midi-chlorian count served as an indicator of one's potential within the Force, although other heritable traits could also influence Force aptitude. Indeed, while Force ability frequently correlated with elevated midi-chlorian counts, this was not invariably the case. While certain medical theories posited that midi-chlorians established the connection between macroscopic organisms and the Force, some Jedi conversely believed that the Force created midi-chlorians to serve as the conduit between itself and other life. Midi-chlorian counts did not impose an upper limit on Force ability; the potential existed for a Jedi to attain a connection to the Force equivalent to that of a Jedi with a higher count. Moreover, and contrary to common misconception, the loss of limbs did not necessarily diminish a being's Force capacity—any such reduction in power stemmed from the mental shortcomings of the wounded Force Sensitive, which could be overcome with willpower, rather than an inherent loss of potential. The singular exception involved Force powers like Lightning, which required channeling through living tissue—even then, only the potential points of origin were restricted.

Midi-chlorians could be manipulated by the Force to generate new life, a technique pioneered by Dark Lord of the Sith Darth Plagueis. The possibility even existed for them to induce conception in a Human; Anakin Skywalker was believed to have been conceived through the agency of midi-chlorians, without a biological father. However, many Jedi deemed this impossible, and the notion elicited only shock when initially presented to the Jedi High Council.

Although subject to testing, midi-chlorians generally did not factor into the medical treatment of most beings, and they were not associated with any known pathology. Chemical substances employed in medicine, such as anesthetics, could thin the midi-chlorians; should their preservation be critical, surgery could be performed without anesthesia. Conversely, the drug bota was believed to augment the effects of midi-chlorians, thereby enhancing an individual's Force-sensitivity. An organism critically injured and beyond the capacity of medical treatment could be infused with blood rich in midi-chlorians, compelling the organism to remain alive when it would otherwise die, as exemplified by General Grievous. However, this procedure would not transfer any of the blood donor's Force-sensitivity.

The Sith virus known as the Sickness could alter the midi-chlorians within an infected individual. The Sith Lord Darth Drear conceived of it as a means of achieving immortality, culminating in the consumption of a living Jedi's heart, thereby acquiring an infusion of midi-chlorians from the Jedi's blood. He ultimately failed to capture a Jedi with a sufficiently high midi-chlorian count before his demise.

When Darth Tenebrous was slain by his apprentice Plagueis on Bal'demnic, a minute fraction of his midi-chlorians, amidst the countless billions within his cells, resisted death. These exceptionally resilient midi-chlorians, privately dubbed maxi-chlorians by Tenebrous himself, had been modified to be long-lived midi-chlorians, and would migrate, not through the Force, but into Plagueis, as a retrovirus designed to infect the host's blood, in order to gain conscience beyond death. Simultaneously, Darth Plagueis perceived Tenebrous' midi-chlorians extinguish, akin to lights gradually deprived of power, yet he could still sense his master within the Force.

Plagueis' work with midi-chlorians was fundamentally rooted in what was conventionally regarded as the Living Force, encompassing energies associated with the anima and pneuma. Concurrently, Plagueis contemplated that while the Unifying Force was not strictly necessary for the creation and manipulation of life, midi-chlorians nonetheless channeled it. Through his investigations, Plagueis discerned that the aperion governed the cohesion of matter, from the atoms of a pebble to all planets and gravity in the universe, including the dimension of time, which could be potentially manipulated on a grand scale, enabling instantaneous translocation from one location to another by folding space, irrespective of intervening distance. The anima governed life, facilitating all instances of Force healing. The pneuma governed consciousness, convincing Plagueis that the energy pattern known as self-awareness could be preserved and imprinted a second time into the neural pathways of a different brain.

Force-sensitive members of the rock-based B'rknaa species possessed microscopic midi-chlorian-infused structures that diverged significantly from the midi-chlorian-infused cells of organic beings.

Despite rumors, the Yinchorr exhibited resistance to Force suggestion. The species possessed a survival mechanism wherein the midi-chlorians safeguarded the consciousness of their hosts by resisting manipulation.

Midi-chlorians could be detected via a blood test that measured their concentration within a being's red blood cells, although such tests were not infallible and were prone to error. Midi-chlorian tests were incorporated into standard medical check-ups, documented in blood analyses. From at least 1000 BBY to 19 BBY, blood tests for midi-chlorians served as the primary means by which the Jedi Order identified Force-sensitive children. These tests were mandatory for beings born in regions controlled by the Galactic Republic. Certain Jedi comlinks could accommodate midi-chlorian samplers for blood sample analysis, although the results required interpolation via a computer, such as those found aboard starships, to ascertain a count. Darth Vader maintained an entire blood-testing system within his meditation chamber, which he utilized not only to detect infections but also to measure his midi-chlorian count.

While the majority of midi-chlorian research was conducted by Jedi healers, the correlation between midi-chlorians and the Force was also investigated within non-Jedi medical circles, with theories proposed regarding their relationship. On Vjun, elevated midi-chlorian counts signified status, being possessed by the more prestigious families. Consequently, interest in midi-chlorians remained substantial on that world.

Experimentation involving midi-chlorians also occurred sporadically. Nobles on Vjun engaged in illicit experiments on these lifeforms in an attempt to augment Force sensitivity, resulting in the population of Vjun descending into insanity. Darth Plagueis, Dark Lord of the Sith, sought a means of influencing midi-chlorians with the Force to generate new life from nothing, and he may have succeeded prior to his demise at the hands of his apprentice. Plagueis also maintained a laboratory on the planet Aborah, where he conducted experiments on various species, altering their midi-chlorians to prolong their lifespans. Sometime later, after assassinating Darth Tenebrous, Darth Venamis sought retribution against Plagueis. However, Venamis was defeated and confined by Plagueis to his laboratory in a near-coma state. Over the years, Plagueis experimented on Venamis, killing and reviving him, manipulating the midi-chlorians within the Bith's body. Consequently, Plagueis concluded that the solution to halting aging lay not in augmenting the number of midi-chlorians within a body but in imposing one's will upon the midi-chlorians already present within the subject; because midi-chlorians were interconnected by a universal mind, those within Plagueis' cells initially resisted his imposition upon their fellows, but eventually he prevailed, initially with small creatures, then with slaves. Through these experiments, Plagueis discovered that these midi-chlorians would not perish; instead, they drew upon sustaining Force energy, which acted at a microscopic level to halt tissue decay within their host, effectively terminating aging and disease. In his writings, Plagueis asserted that this could only be achieved through sharpened mental focus and an affinity for the Force, enabling a measurable impact on living cells. Darth Drear, another Sith Lord, integrated midi-chlorians into his own research on immortality.

The Force detector represented one of the tools developed to measure midi-chlorian counts. Based on the designs of the scientist Jenna Zan Arbor, the Force Detector comprised a pair of paddles connected to a control pack; the paddles were positioned around the subject, whereupon the control pack would display a list of statistics, including midi-chlorian count. It also generated a blue nimbus around a wireframe hologram of the subject; while this correlated with Force-sensitivity, it did not constitute a direct measurement of the subject's midi-chlorian concentration. The DRK-1 Dark Eye probe droid, a tool utilized by the Sith, was also capable of scanning lifeforms for the presence of midi-chlorians.

The measurement of midi-chlorian counts was not invariably accurate, particularly among older children or individuals with atypical psychologies. Consequently, the Jedi occasionally employed alternative methods to ascertain Force-sensitivity, such as testing with a mental maze or testing screen.

Midi-chlorians originated on a luminous planet situated somewhere "in the heart of the galaxy," according to the Five Priestesses.

Prior to the establishment of the Jedi Order around 25,783 BBY, various Force sects, including the Followers of Palawa, Chatos Academy, and Order of Dai Bendu, engaged in the scientific study of the Force, encompassing the science of midi-chlorians, on worlds ranging from Had Abbadon to Ondos. The Sith possessed knowledge of midi-chlorians by c. 4645 BBY, when Darth Drear utilized them in his experiments on immortality. Circa 3956 BBY, the Rakata, a species that had nearly lost all trace of Force-sensitivity, conducted their own scientific investigations to identify a genetic basis for the Force, hoping to regain their Force-sensitivity. The methods employed by the Jedi to detect Force-sensitives in their early millennia have been lost to time, but shortly after the Battle of Ruusan in 1000 BBY, midi-chlorians were either discovered by them for the first time or rediscovered after having lost knowledge of them in an earlier era—at least one Jedi, Hestizo Trace, had known of the existence of midi-chlorians as early as 3645 BBY. Blood tests for midi-chlorians were implemented to identify recruits with a connection to the Force, a method utilized by the Jedi for nearly a thousand years until the purge of the Jedi in 19 BBY. In an event that would have long-term repercussions, a prophecy was made in these early days of a Chosen One who would restore balance to the Force and was said to have a high concentration of midi-chlorians.

On the world of Vjun, a high midi-chlorian count was synonymous with status, leading to a surge of interest in midi-chlorian phenomena. When Vjun came into contact with the Galactic Republic and Jedi Order, the most eminent families—those with the highest counts—sought to protect themselves from Jedi recruitment by augmenting their own abilities. The seventeenth Viscount Malreaux of the esteemed House Malreaux, along with a consortium of others, worked to genetically manipulate the midi-chlorians and thereby enhance the counts of Vjun's population. They were successful, but at a cost: when the entire planet became Force-sensitive with no mental training to handle it, the populace went mad and murdered each other.

In the decades preceding the Battle of Naboo, Dark Lord of the Sith Darth Plagueis initiated his own experiments with midi-chlorians. While the Jedi regarded these cellular organelles as symbionts, Plagueis believed they were interlopers, interfering with the Force and impeding a being's ability to directly contact the Force. Through years of experimentation, Plagueis cultivated an ability to perceive the actions of midi-chlorians. Furthermore, Plagueis believed that only the Sith understood that sentient life was on the verge of a transformative leap; that through the manipulation of midi-chlorians, or the overthrow of the Forceful group that supervised them, the divide between organic life and the Force could be bridged, and death could be erased from the continuum. In order to further the Grand Plan, Darth Plagueis, and his apprentice, Darth Sidious, committed an act in direct violation to the nature of the Force, and attempted to tip its balance toward the dark side. The experiment yielded unfruitful however, and the midi-chlorians, unwilling to comply, struck back in retaliation conceiving a savior to ultimately destroy the Sith: the prophesied Chosen One, Anakin Skywalker.

In 32 BBY, Jedi Master Qui-Gon Jinn found himself stranded on the planet Tatooine, where he encountered the slave boy Anakin Skywalker. Jinn sensed a strong presence of the Force within Skywalker, and upon learning from the boy's mother, Shmi Skywalker, that Anakin had no father, Jinn realized that there was something extraordinary about him. That night, Jinn obtained a blood sample from a scrape on Skywalker's arm and tested it, informing the boy that he was checking for infections. Jinn instructed his Padawan Obi-Wan Kenobi to conduct a midi-chlorian test on the sample; Kenobi was astonished to discover that Skywalker's count was off the charts—exceeding 20,000. This surpassed even that of the powerful Master Yoda, or any other Jedi. Jinn subsequently brought Skywalker to the galactic capital of Coruscant and presented him before the Jedi Council. There, he informed them of Skywalker's unusually high midi-chlorian count and expressed his belief that the boy had been conceived by the midi-chlorians. Jinn was alluding to the prophecy of the Chosen One; while the Council acknowledged the reference, they did not concur with Jinn's conclusion, although some Jedi nonetheless believed Skywalker possessed the potential to become the most powerful Jedi ever. The lore of the Sith Lords claimed that Skywalker's conception had been a result of Plagueis' manipulations of the midi-chlorians.

By these latter years of the Republic, midi-chlorians were a matter of public knowledge, though some found the idea of them to be unclear. In 22 BBY, the Spotts TradeChip Company released a set of tradechips of famous Jedi Knights, featuring data, including midi-chlorian counts, garnered from what the company called the "best information available." However, the chips attracted criticism from the Jedi Order for their inaccuracies, as did the midi-chlorian counts provided; Yoda's, for example, provided the wildly inaccurate number of four million. Spotts defended its product, claiming that all mistakes were minor.

Later that year, Count Dooku, leader of the Separatist movement, revealed to the Jedi that Plagueis' apprentice Darth Sidious secretly controlled the Galactic Senate. Seventeen months later, the Jedi Ronhar Kim conceived of the idea to test the midi-chlorian counts of the senators, believing that the Force-sensitive Sith would be revealed in this way. Kim approached Supreme Chancellor Palpatine with his plan, but Palpatine, who secretly was Sidious, discouraged him, advising him that it would be politically impossible. Upon learning that Kim had not spoken of his idea to the Jedi Council, Palpatine arranged for the Jedi to be killed in a trap, and Kim's plan was never implemented.

In the waning years of the Galactic Republic, both Jedi healers and other medical professionals dedicated time to the study of midi-chlorians. During the Clone Wars, the Kaminoan scientist Ko Sai, who had defected, was among those who endeavored to unravel the enigmas surrounding midi-chlorians and the Jedi genome. As the Jedi Order aged, it developed a prohibition against empirical investigations into the Force and its concrete elements, as they believed it was beyond the scope of scientific analysis. However, this prohibition was lifted when the Order was dissolved and the Galactic Empire was declared. Emperor Palpatine's scientists regarded the Force as a purely physical phenomenon, dissecting it into tangible components such as midi-chlorians and energy. The Force Detector and the Force-detecting chip emerged as direct results of these investigations, and the Inquisitorius employed them during the Great Jedi Purge. Throughout the Empire's rule, midi-chlorian tests were routinely administered on worlds in the Inner and Mid Rim to identify Force-sensitive individuals and hidden Jedi. These individuals were rarely heard from again. Consequently, an illicit market for drugs and blood treatments arose, purportedly capable of deceiving the tests or reducing an individual's midi-chlorian count; however, these were largely ineffective.

Following the rise of the Empire, Palpatine issued a strict decree prohibiting all information pertaining to the Jedi or the Force, ordering its removal from data banks across the galaxy. Statute OB-CPO-1198, which addressed unlawful medical research, including midi-chlorian studies, was also put into effect. With the Jedi's midi-chlorian records no longer accessible for research and information on their connection to the Force excluded from medical libraries, medical practitioners possessed limited knowledge of midi-chlorians, even as they continued to test for them. When Kornell Divini, a doctor stationed on the Death Star, detected an unusually high midi-chlorian count in one of his patients, he sought additional information on midi-chlorians via the MedNet. Divini's inquiry triggered warning systems established by the Empire, drawing the attention of Darth Vader, the Emperor's servant, and Divini was subsequently arrested under the terms of OB-CPO-1198.

At a highly classified facility located on the Frozen moon within the Unknown Regions, Imperial scientists, under the direction of Grand Admiral Thrawn, gathered DNA from numerous Force-sensitive individuals and created clones, modifying the midi-chlorians present in their blood.

When Luke Skywalker founded his New Jedi Order in 11 ABY, he lacked any knowledge of midi-chlorian testing, compelling him to develop his own methods for identifying Force-sensitive individuals. The Order rediscovered the midi-chlorian method at some point before 40 ABY.

The concept of midi-chlorians was initially conceived by George Lucas as far back as 1977. During this period, the initial Expanded Universe works were being developed, including the ongoing Marvel Star Wars comic series and Alan Dean Foster's novel Splinter of the Mind's Eye. Lucas met with Carol Titelman, a staff member, to provide guidelines for these projects, explaining various aspects of his fictional universe. Among these explanations was the concept of midi-chlorians, which were said to be more abundant in the cells of Force-sensitive beings. However, Lucas felt he lacked the time to introduce the midi-chlorian concept at that time. The idea remained dormant in Star Wars media for twenty-two years; Lucas ultimately chose 1999's Star Wars: Episode I The Phantom Menace as the appropriate venue to first mention midi-chlorians, using them to explain why some individuals possessed Force sensitivity while others did not, a question he had left unanswered since the original film, Star Wars. Lucas integrated the midi-chlorian explanation into the film as part of Anakin Skywalker's journey to comprehend the Force. The fact that Lucas had planned the midi-chlorians as early as 1977 was alluded to in the DVD commentary for The Phantom Menace, but the full details were not revealed until eight years later, in the 2007 book The Making of Star Wars: The Definitive Story Behind the Original Film. The hardcover edition of this book included Lucas' notes for Expanded Universe authors as appendices. Despite this, Lucas suggested that the principles of being a Jedi could be practiced by "anyone" when discussing the story treatment for Star Wars: Episode VI Return of the Jedi in 1981 (then-titled Revenge of the Jedi), and in particular the backstory for Anakin (who had been revealed to be Darth Vader), comparing it to yoga or karate. In addition, JW Rinzler also indicated in another interview that George Lucas added the midi-chlorian concept to his statements after the fact in the Making of Star Wars hardcover edition.

Midi-chlorians, as depicted in The Phantom Menace, are part of a recurring theme of symbiotic relationships throughout the film. They were loosely inspired by mitochondria, organelles responsible for providing energy to cells; much like midi-chlorians, it is believed that mitochondria were once independent organisms that inhabited living cells and subsequently became integral parts of them; even now, mitochondria function somewhat as independent lifeforms, possessing their own DNA. Lucas established this connection with mitochondria, particularly the necessity of midi-chlorians for the existence of life, as a metaphor for society; specifically, he states that all elements of society must coexist harmoniously, much like midi-chlorians and their symbiont. In 2006, as a tribute to this resemblance, a newly discovered species of bacteria residing within mitochondria was named Midichloria mitochondrii after the midi-chlorians. Its discoverer, Nate Lo, sought and received Lucas' permission to use the name.

Although midi-chlorians did not make a public appearance until 1999, pre–Phantom Menace Expanded Universe materials hinted at a biological connection to the Force within individuals. In Jedi Search, Lando Calrissian conducts a search for potential Jedi for Luke Skywalker's new academy using a device capable of detecting an affinity for the Force. In the Thrawn Trilogy, two organisms are mentioned, the vornskrs and the ysalamiri, which have evolved the capacity to utilize the Force to hunt prey and to block the Force, respectively.

Back in 2018, George Lucas, in "James Cameron's Story of Science Fiction" stated that The Midi-chlorians were conduits used by cars (ourselves) that carried passengers (Whills) to travel around in, explaining later that The Midi-chlorians communicate with those passengers.

On April 1, 2006, several entries pertaining to George Lucas' Willow universe were added to the StarWars.com Databank as an April Fools' Day prank. The update page identifies the planet Andowyne as the potential origin world of the midi-chlorians.

The non-canonical comic Tag & Bink: Revenge of the Clone Menace recounts other consequences of Darth Plagueis' manipulations of the midi-chlorians: Tag Greenley and Bink Otauna gained Force sensitivity, while a red sun and its planet, whose sole survivor would later become a hero on Earth, were destroyed—references to Krypton and Superman, respectively.

In the introductory page of Star Wars Tales 10, Dark Horse Comics editor David Land ventures inside a Jedi Knight with the assistance of droid 2-1B in search of midi-chlorians. He discovers that they resemble assistant editor Philip Simon, and subsequently orders them back to work.

The Tales story "Skippy the Jedi Droid" references the similarly named midi-chloroxians, which are found in the lubricants of the eponymous droid, granting it mastery over the Force.

Midi-chlorians have faced some opposition from fans; some perceive them as introducing rigid science into the perceived "mysteriousness" or spirituality of the Force and disapprove of what they view as a novel concept. Conversely, others argue that the presence of a physical aspect to a mystical Force draws parallels to real-world religious traditions, believing that midi-chlorians have enhanced the mythic qualities of the Force.

A common misconception is that midi-chlorians, rather than being indicators, are actually the Force itself or its creators; there is no canonical basis for this belief. Steve Perry, who incorporated midi-chlorians into his novel Death Star, expressed his opinion that they were "less than inspired." George Lucas, on the other hand, distinguishes between the two aspects of the Force, considering midi-chlorians as the practical, biological facet, separate from the spiritual and metaphysical dimensions of the Force.