Lorentz factor

noun

Lorentz factor

noun

Etymology From its appearance in Lorentzian electrodynamics, named after Dutch physicist Hendrik Lorentz.

1

a factor arising in special relativity, to calculate the degree of time dilation, length contraction and relativistic mass of an object moving relative to an observer, defined as (1-v²/c²)^(-0.5), where v and c are relative velocity and the speed of light, respectively

Related terms
speed parameter

Entry derived from the Wiktionary, under licence CC BY-SA 4.0 — list of authors.