In Star Trek Magazine issue 144, Scott Chambliss, production designer on Star Trek, noted that the appearance of red matter as a “big red ball” was a reference to other productions that he had worked on with J.J. Abrams, including Alias and Mission: Impossible III.

https://memory-alpha.fandom.com/wiki/Red_matter

It was called Red Mercury in Alias and Red Matter in Star Trek and I didn’t see Mission: Impossible III. The point is it’s a big red ball of stuff and he keeps putting it in his shows and movies.