KAB rating

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KAB Rating (which stands for Kyle Afferent Body Rating, sometimes shortened to Kyle Rating) refers the strength of a psion's empathic and telepathic abilities, in the Saga of the Skolian Empire books by Catherine Asaro.

The rating is inversely based on how many people it would take to find an individual with a given size of Kyle organs (Kyle Afferent Body or Kyle Efferent Body) which are the organs of the brain responsible for natural interpersonal electromagnetic communications, aka telepathy and empathy.

Most humans rate between 0 to 2 on this logarithmic scale. A three or higher indicates a psion with empathic abilities; a six denotes a psion with telepathic abilities. A psion with a Kyle Rating of 6 can only be found in a population the size of 10 to the 6th power (about one per metropolitan area, or one per thinly populated world). As another example, a full telepath is usually a psion with a Kyle Rating of 10, and can only be found in a population the size of 10 to the 10th power (about one per fully populated world, or one per moderately populated star system).

In theory, the Rhon is that group of people theorized to have a rating too high to measure numerically. In practice, the Rhon are those belonging to the Ruby Dynasty, genetically interblended clan formed from members of the Selei, Skolia, Valdoria, Pulivok, Qox, and Varz families.

Only the Rhon have sufficient Kyle Rating to interface with the ancient Ruby psiberspace portals known as Locks.

There are several hundred genes that result in Kyle abilities. They are recessive, and survive genetically by producing strong pheromones that draw Rhon-level psions together. The higher the KAB rating, the more likely and more severe the abnormalities and deformaties in any children produced.