Technology based on extending the range of the Strong Force?

[Fanghur]

Does anyone know whether there would be any interesting applications if we could somehow figure out how to selectively extend the range of the Strong Force on the matter occupying a desired area? I recently finished reading a sci-fi book where a hostile alien species attacks the solar system with a probe like this. It says that they extended the range of the Strong Force from the subatomic to the molecular range, resulting in the probe being effectively indestructible (essentially it had the strength of neutronium but without the enormous mass). But I have no clue whether there’s any realism at all in the idea, even assuming that such a means of manipulating the fundamental forces could be found.

[Genady]

4 hours ago, Fanghur said:

Does anyone know whether there would be any interesting applications if we could somehow figure out how to selectively extend the range of the Strong Force on the matter occupying a desired area? I recently finished reading a sci-fi book where a hostile alien species attacks the solar system with a probe like this. It says that they extended the range of the Strong Force from the subatomic to the molecular range, resulting in the probe being effectively indestructible (essentially it had the strength of neutronium but without the enormous mass). But I have no clue whether there’s any realism at all in the idea, even assuming that such a means of manipulating the fundamental forces could be found.

What does prevent the molecules from collapsing to subatomic scales?

[joigus]

There's a reason why science fiction is called fiction.

The property you want to circumvent is called "confinement" of the strong nuclear force. It would be interesting to try and see if people have thought about this.

I bet it's impossible, but that's never stopped people from trying.

[swansont]

If you could do this, you would get larger nuclei that are stable vs alpha decay, and what are now fissionable materials would not be.

[Duda Jarek]

In halo nuclei there are stably (milliseconds) bind neutrons/protons in much larger distances ... but we are still talking about a few femtometers.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Halo_nucleus

http://theor.jinr.ru/~ntaa/17/files/lectures/Ershov.pdf