Polywater was a hypothesized polymerized form of water that was the subject of much scientific controversy during the late 1960s, first described by Soviet scientist Nikolai Fedyakin.
By 1969 the popular press had taken notice of Western attempts to recreate the substance and sparked fears of a "polywater gap" between the United States and Soviet Union.
[5] In 1961, the Soviet physicist Nikolai Fedyakin, working at the Technological Institute of Kostroma, Russia, performed measurements on the properties of water which had been condensed in, or repeatedly forced through, narrow quartz capillary tubes.
Denis Rousseau and Sergio Porto of Bell Labs carried out infrared spectrum analysis, which showed polywater to be mostly chlorine and sodium.
[11] Denis Rousseau undertook an experiment with his own sweat after playing a handball game at the lab and found it had identical properties.
In August 1973, Derjaguin and N. V. Churaev published a letter in the journal Nature in which they wrote; "these [anomalous] properties should be attributed to impurities rather than to the existence of polymeric water molecules".
In the original episode, a scientific research outpost falls victim to polywater, which causes the crew to become so incapacitated that they all died after shutting off environmental controls in the compound.
The Star Trek: Lower Decks episode "I, Excretus" briefly features a simulated version of the USS Cerritos plagued by polywater intoxication, leading to a shipwide orgy, as part of a holodeck drill.
The story "Polywater Doodle" by Howard L. Myers appeared in the February 1971 issue of Analog Science Fiction and Fact.