matter transmitter n.

a device for conveying matter over a distance by transforming it into energy or information, beaming this to another location, and reconstituting the original matter at the destination; cf. matter transmission n.

  • [1930 J. W. Campbell The Voice of the Void in Amazing Stories Quarterly Summer 392/1 page image John W. Campbell, Jr. bibliography

    Of the fleet of ten great ships, and the accompanying matter-sender, six ships returned. The rest floated out there in the interplanetary space around Betelguese.]

  • 1931 ‘L. F. Stone’ Conquest of Gola in Wonder Stories Apr. 1280/1 page image Leslie F. Stone

    With me at her side, Geble hastened to the beam station and there in the matter transmitter we dispatched our physical beings to the palace at Tola.

  • 1969 T.M. Disch Echo Round His Bones (1970) 13

    The captain’s position in the military establishment had brought him…into contact with that phenomenon which, of all the phenomena of the age, was most advanced, most contemporary, most at the forefront of the future—with, in short, the matter transmitter.

  • 1991 A. D. Foster Cat.a.lyst ix. 133 Alan Dean Foster

    Now somebody’s gonna have to explain away that matter transmitter. Or are you going to tell me it was a Kodak moment that brought us all the way across the Andes.

  • 1999 Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction Oct. 266/2

    Matter…is at bottom a message, since it can be turned into energy and propagated. Nevertheless, the awesome radio did not develop into a matter transmitter, which is no closer to reality than it was a century ago.

  • 2013 M. Moorcock Lost Canal in Old Mars (2015) 375 page image Michael Moorcock bibliography

    Later, I worked on a matter transmitter for the Pentagon. I tested it on myself. It went wrong. I was dragged back to old Mars instead.

Research requirements

antedating 1931
Earliest cite

L. F. Stone, in Wonder Stories
Research History
Ben Ostrowsky submitted a 2013 cite from Michael Moorcock.

In the OED, with an earliest date of 1931.

Last modified 2021-10-28 19:00:24
In the compilation of some entries, HDSF has drawn extensively on corresponding entries in OED.