Octavia Muss (played by Athena Karkanis) is named after famed science fiction writer Octavia E. Butler, author of the Patternist series, the Xenogenesis series and the Earthseed series.
The small capsules Lt. Lopez (Greg Bryk!) takes are 'focus' drugs, allowing him to be hyper-aware of the captives emotional state and body language … effectively turning him into a human lie detector.
Anderson Dawes (played by Jared Harris) is named after Howard 'Howdy' Dawes, a western music singer of the early 1950s who lived next to one of the writers in the 1970s.
You may recognize Jean Yoon (Captain Yao) from her appearances on Orphan Black, Beauty and the Beast and Peg+Cat, as well as Syfy's own Lost Girl and Warehouse 13.