Search the Dictionary

A modification of the aëroplane, having curved surfaces, the advantages of which were first demonstrated by Lilienthal.

A plane or arched surface for sustaining bodies by its movement through the air; a spread wing, as of a bird.

Not forming an angle. Agonic line (Physics), an imaginary line on the earth's surface passing through those places where the magnetic needle points to the true north; the line of no magnetic variation. There is one such line in the Western hemisphere, and another in the Eastern hemisphere.

(Aëronautics) A small plane or surface capable of being manipulated by the pilot of a flying machine to preserve or destroy lateral balance; a hinged wing tip; a lateral stabilizing or balancing plane.

n gasoline-engine motor vehicles, the cooling of the cylinder by increasing its radiating surface by means of ribs or radiators, and placing it so that it is exposed to a current of air. Cf. Water cooling. -- Air"-cooled`, a.

A stove for heating a current of air which is directed against its surface by means of pipes, and then distributed through a building.

Whiteness. Specifically: (Astron.) The ratio which the light reflected from an unpolished surface bears to the total light falling upon that surface.

A vessel of porous earthenware, used for cooling liquids by evaporation from the exterior surface.

are found not only on the banks of rivers, and in their beds, but are scattered over the surface of vast plains. R. Cobden.

Partaking of two natures, as the perianth of some endogenous plants, where the outer surface is calycine, and the inner petaloid.

State of being ample; extent of surface or space; largeness of dimensions; size. The cathedral of Lincoln . . . is a magnificent structure, proportionable to the amplitude of the diocese. Fuller.

One of the rounded prominences of the lower surface of the lateral hemispheres of the cerebellum, each side of the vallecula.

peculiar relations to circles; -- sometimes called bicircular quartics. -- Anallagmatic surfaces, a certain class of surfaces of the fourth degree.

A distorted or monstrous projection or representation of an image on a plane or curved surface, which, when viewed from a certain point, or as reflected from a curved mirror or through a polyhedron, appears regular and in proportion; a deformation of an image.

, when it is lifted out of the ground. -- The anchor is awash, when it is hove up to the surface of the water. -- At anchor, anchored. -- To back an anchor, to increase the holding power by laying down a small anchor ahead of that by which the ship rides, with the cable fastened to the crown of the latter to prevent…

e made by the meeting of two arcs of great circles, which mutually cut one another on the surface of a globe or sphere. -- Visual angle, the angle formed by two rays of light, or two straight lines drawn from the extreme points of an object to the center of the eye. -- For Angles of commutation, draught, incidence, r…

A narrow circle of some distinct color on a surface or round an organ.

o assume different positions when resting, Culex usually holding the body parallel to the surface on which it rests and keeping the head and beak bent at an angle, while Anopheles holds the body at an angle with the surface and the head and beak in line with it. Unless they become themselves infected by previously biti…

curved longitudinally in one direction and transversely in the opposite direction, as the surface of a saddle.

An articular surface on the ilium of birds against which the great trochanter of the femur plays.