This page gathers the 3,177 dictionary entries belonging to the domain “Physics”, as labelled by Wiktionary. Each word leads to its full entry: definitions, etymology, pronunciation, examples. Page 16 of 32: from “Kirchhoff's circuit laws” to “luminal”.
- Kirchhoff's circuit laws noun A pair of fundamental natural laws dealing with the relations of currents at a junction and the voltages around a loop.
- kludge noun An improvised device, typically crudely constructed to test the validity of a principle before implementing a finished design.
- Knudsen flow noun The flow of a gas in which the mean free path of its molecules is much longer than the characteristic dimension of the tube etc that it is…
- Knudsen gas noun A gas in a state of such low density that the average distance travelled by the its molecules between collisions (mean free path) is…
- Knudsen layer noun A thin layer of vapor near a liquid or solid, where the gas's behavior is dominated by interactions with the liquid or solid.
- Kondo effect noun The scattering of conduction electrons in a metal due to magnetic impurities, resulting in a characteristic change, that is, a minimum in…
- kosmotropic adj Describing ions (normally small, with a high charge density) that stabilize intermolecular interactions in water, especially by stabilizing…
- lab on a chip noun A chip, combining semiconductor and microfluidics technologies, capable of handling and analyzing very small quantities of a sample…
- laddertron noun A device, in the form of a series of metal bars joined by non-conducting links, used in electrostatic accelerators
- lambda noun Unit representation of wavelength.
- lambda baryon noun Any of three particles, having no electric charge and an isotopic spin of 1, composed of an up quark, down quark and either a strange…
- lambda point noun The temperature that is the transition point between the normal and the superfluid forms of helium (at a particular pressure)
- laminar adj In the form of thin flat electronic circuits, usually flexible
- laminar flow noun A smooth, streamline type of viscous flow in which the fluid behaves as a system of orderly layers, with no eddies or irregular…
- land noun A conducting area on a board or chip which can be used for connecting wires.
- Landau level noun Any of the discrete energy values that represent the only cyclotron orbits that a charged particle can occupy in a magnetic field, as a…
- Landauer limit noun A theoretical lower limit on the energy consumption of a computation, derived from Landauer's principle.
- Langevin function noun a mathematical function that describes the behaviour of paramagnetic materials and the dielectric properties of insulators
- lanthanide contraction noun the progressive decrease in the radii of atoms of the lanthanide elements as the atomic number increases; evident in various physical…
- Laplace operator noun A differential operator, denoted ∆ and defined on ℝⁿ as Δ=∑ᵢ₌₁ⁿ(∂²)/(∂x_i²), used in the modeling of wave propagation, heat flow and many…
- large scale integration noun An integration type for digital circuits that contain tens of thousands of transistors providing thousands of logic gates per chip.
- Larmor precession noun The precession of the motion of charged particles, or particles having a magnetic moment, in a magnetic field.
- laser cooling noun the process of using the force exerted by a laser to reduce the temperature of a gas, or the spread of velocities of a beam of atoms
- laser-plasma accelerator noun A kind of plasma accelerator that uses an amplitude-modulated intense laser beam to excite a large-amplitude plasma wave that propagates at…
- latch noun An electronic circuit that is like a flip-flop, except that it is level triggered instead of edge triggered.
- latch-up noun A kind of short circuit caused by the inadvertent creation of a low-impedance path between the power supply rails of a MOSFET circuit.
- latency noun A delay, an interval between the initiation of something and the occurrence.
- lateral adj Acting or placed at right angles to a line of motion or strain.
- lattice theory noun A lattice model, a mathematical model based on a lattice (discrete subgroup of Rⁿ); the study of such models.
- law of attraction noun A physical law describing how bodies attract one another, as by gravitation or electromagnetism.
- Lawson criterion noun A necessary, but not sufficient, condition for the achievement of sustained release of energy from a nuclear fusion reactor; that the…
- layout noun A specification of an integrated circuit showing the position of the physical components that will implement the schematic in silicon.
- lead noun The angle between the line joining the brushes of a continuous-current dynamo and the diameter symmetrical between the poles.
- leg noun A branch circuit; one phase of a polyphase system.
- Legendre transformation noun A formula for converting a Lagrangian function to a Hamiltonian function (or vice versa).
- Lenard effect noun The separation of electric charges (and ionization) accompanying the aerodynamic breakup of water droplets.
- length scale noun A particular length or distance whose value is determined to one order of magnitude (or to very few orders of magnitude)
- lens noun An object, usually made of glass, that focuses or defocuses the light that passes through it.
- Lense-Thirring precession noun In general relativity, a relativistic correction to the precession of a gyroscope near a large rotating mass such as the Earth.
- lepto- prefix lepton
- lepton noun An elementary particle that has a spin of 1/2 (i.e., is a fermion) and does not interact via the strong nuclear force; examples include the…
- lepton number noun A quantum number related to the difference between the number of leptons and antileptons in a system
- let through noun A transient voltage spike that is allowed to pass through a power conditioning unit to the load
- level adj Perpendicular to a gravitational force.
- level-triggered adj Describing a circuit or component whose output is sensitive to changes of the inputs only so long as the clock input's signal is high.
- leviton noun The collective excitation of a single electron within an electrical conductor such as a metal or graphene.
- levogyrate adj Turning or twisting the plane of polarization towards the left, as in levulose, levotartaric acid, etc.
- Li-ion noun Abbreviation of lithium ion battery.
- LiBeB process noun Any nucleosynthesis process, the details of which are unclear, that accounts for the light elements lithium, beryllium and boron which…
- liberate verb To cause (energy or a substance) to be released through a chemical reaction or physical decomposition.
- ligand field theory noun a theory, a combination of the earlier crystal field theory with molecular orbital theory, that describes the structure of coordination…
- light noun Electromagnetic radiation in the wavelength range visible to the human eye (about 400–750 nanometers): visible light.
- light clock noun A hypothetical clock, used to show time dilation, that would count the journeys of a single photon between two parallel mirrors.
- light profile noun A description of the distribution of light intensity.
- light sector noun The known universe; the part of the universe that is not part of the dark sector; the segment of the universe that is explained by the…
- light spectrum noun The portion of the electromagnetic spectrum that is visible to humans.
- light wave noun An electromagnetic wave of light.
- light-emitting diode noun A rectifying semiconductor device which converts electrical energy into electromagnetic radiation of a wavelength in or near the visible…
- light-scattering photometry noun any optical method used to measure the extent of the scattering of light by suspended particles or by macromolecules
- limb brightening noun The optical effect where, when certain wavelengths (not in the spectrum of visible light) are examined, the edge of the disk of a star…
- limiter noun A circuit that allows signals below a specified input threshold to pass unaffected while attenuating the peaks of stronger signals.
- line card noun A modular electronic circuit designed to fit on a separate PCB and interface with a telecommunications access network.
- line conductor noun A wire or cable that transports electrical current from the power supply to the consumer, usually color-coded with a brown or black casing.
- line of force noun An imaginary line in a field of force, whose tangent at any point gives the direction of the field at that point and whose number through…
- line spectrum noun A spectrum, typically produced by a luminous gas, that consists of separate lines typical of particular elements
- linear adj A type of length measurement involving only one spatial dimension (as opposed to area or volume).
- linewidth noun A measure of the width of the band of frequencies of radiation emitted or absorbed in an atomic or molecular transition; a result of the…
- liquid crystal noun A phase of matter similar to a liquid, in which the molecules are arranged regularly in one or two dimensions.
- liquid helium noun The liquified form of helium that does not solidify even at absolute zero; it shows unusual properties, such as superfluidity, due to…
- liquid phase noun One of the three fundamental structural phases of matter in which the thermal mobility of molecules or atoms is comparable with the…
- liquid scintillation noun The scintillation of a solvent molecule when a radioactive solute molecule undergoes beta decay and emits an electron
- liquidus noun A line, in a phase diagram, above which a given substance is a stable liquid and below which solid and liquid are in equilibrium.
- lithiation noun The incorporation of lithium into an electrode in a lithium-ion battery
- lithium ion battery noun A type of rechargeable battery containing lithium compounds but not elemental lithium, used in many consumer electronics devices.
- lithium-6 noun A stable isotope 63Li, having three protons and three neutrons, that makes up about 7% of natural lithium; it is used in the nuclear…
- lithium-7 noun A stable isotope, 73Li, having three protons and four neutrons, that makes up about 93% of natural lithium.
- lithiumlike adj Having a similar electronic structure to that of a lithium atom
- Little-Parks effect noun A phenomenon whereby passing a fluctuating magnetic field through a superconductor can slightly suppress its superconductivity.
- Littrow prism noun A retroreflecting dispersing prism arranged so that an incident light beam entering at Brewster's angle undergoes minimal deviation and…
- live conductor noun Any conductor carrying electrical current.
- live wire noun An electrical wire through which there is a flow of electrical current.
- load noun The electrical current or power delivered by a device.
- load bank noun A piece of electrical test equipment used to simulate an electrical load, to test an electric power source without connecting it to its…
- load factor noun The mean load over a given time period divided by the peak load occurring during the same time period, providing a measure of how…
- local cell noun A very small galvanic cell formed by differences in potential between adjacent areas of a metal surface in contact with an electrolyte…
- logamediate adj Describing a proposed form of cosmological inflation whose rate is intermediate between logarithmic and exponential.
- logarithmic decrement noun The logarithm of the ratio of two successive amplitudes separated by one period for oscillators (second-order linear dynamical systems).
- London moment noun A quantum-mechanical phenomenon whereby a spinning superconductive metal sphere generates a magnetic field whose axis lines up exactly with…
- lookahead time noun The elapsed time of a subject reaching a given point.
- loop quantum gravity noun A theory which attempts to reconcile quantum mechanics and general relativity, according to which space can be regarded as an extremely…
- Lorenz gauge noun A partial gauge fixing of the electromagnetic vector potential, used to eliminate the redundant spin-0 component in the (1/2,1/2)…
- lossless junction noun An interconnection point between components or transmission lines where the total power or energy entering the junction is exactly equal to…
- lossy adj Of an electricity transmission line, subject to various forms of power loss.
- lost neutral noun A dangerous situation where the neutral wire in a split-phase power system becomes broken or disconnected, forcing all electrical current…
- low wire noun A cable carrying electrical power at fifty volts or less.
- low-powered adj Possessing little power or capacity.
- lowpass adj Describing a filter, circuit, or system that rejects or attenuates a frequencies above a specified value while passing those be.
- lug noun A device for terminating an electrical conductor to facilitate the mechanical connection; to the conductor it may be crimped to form a cold…
- lumen noun In the International System of Units, the derived unit of luminous flux; the light that is emitted in a solid angle of one steradian from a…
- luminal adj of or pertaining to the nature of light