For the Ugandan poet, see Okot p'Bitek

Okot p'Bitek

Okot p'Bitek was a Ugandan poet, who achieved wide international recognition for Song of Lawino, a long poem dealing with the tribulations of a rural African wife whose husband has taken up urban life and wishes everything to be westernised...

Bitek is a fictional substance mentioned numerous times in the Night's Dawn Trilogy

The Night's Dawn Trilogy

British author Peter F. Hamilton's The Night's Dawn Trilogy consists of three science fiction novels: The Reality Dysfunction , The Neutronium Alchemist , and The Naked God...

 by Peter F. Hamilton

Peter F. Hamilton

Peter F. Hamilton is a British author. He is best known for writing space opera. As of the publication of his tenth novel in 2004, his works had sold over two million copies worldwide.- Biography :...

. Bitek is in essence a supremely advanced Edenist biotechnology

Biotechnology

Biotechnology is a field of applied biology that involves the use of living organisms and bioprocesses in engineering, technology, medicine and other fields requiring bioproducts. Biotechnology also utilizes these products for manufacturing purpose...

 which can grow and change shape. Bitek is technically living material, however it is genetically engineered to act similarly to a computer, often "programmed" via affinity (telepathy).

Edenists use bitek for almost everything. For example, a bitek spider can be used to spy on others covertly, since it can have sensors and a broadcaster. Voidhawks (Edenist spaceships) and habitats are almost entirely made of Bitek which are grown from eggs and or seeds respectively, which are later adapted through various means to fill specific roles
if need be.

Bitek habitats are essentially gigantic living biosphere

Biosphere

The biosphere is the global sum of all ecosystems. It can also be called the zone of life on Earth, a closed and self-regulating system...

s; the Bitek habitats like the Voidhawks are sentient in and off themselves and are controlled through affinity which allows them to readily adapt and to grow functions to suit the needs of their inhabitants. Bitek habitats usually orbit gas giant

Gas giant

A gas giant is a large planet that is not primarily composed of rock or other solid matter. There are four gas giants in the Solar System: Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, and Neptune...

s (for the Helium-3

Helium-3

Helium-3 is a light, non-radioactive isotope of helium with two protons and one neutron. It is rare on Earth, and is sought for use in nuclear fusion research...

 they contain) and some, e.g. Tranquillity, have the ability to "jump" away from a battle. This is achieved via specialist organs known as "patterning nodes" which open controlled wormhole

Wormhole

In physics, a wormhole is a hypothetical topological feature of spacetime that would be, fundamentally, a "shortcut" through spacetime. For a simple visual explanation of a wormhole, consider spacetime visualized as a two-dimensional surface. If this surface is folded along a third dimension, it...

s.