07-23-2009, 01:04 PM
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#8 (permalink)
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Super Moderator
Location: essex ma
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my pal the oxford english dictionary offers the following as symbolic meanings attached the the letter S:
Quote:
II. Symbolic uses.
5. s or S (Physics and Chem.) = sharp: orig. used to designate one of the four main series of lines in atomic spectra, but now more frequently applied to electronic orbitals, states, etc., possessing zero angular momentum and total symmetry.
6. [Initial letter of secondary.] Used, chiefly in S wave, to denote an earthquake wave which oscillates transversely to the direction of propagation, a shear wave; so named because secondary waves arrive at a given place later than primary waves. (See also P III. 3.)
7. In Physics, s and S denote the quantum numbers of spin angular momentum of one electron and a group of electrons, respectively. [Introduced by F. Hund 1926, in Zeitschr. f. Physik XXXVI. 658.]
8. S is used to denote one of the two directions of twist (see quot. 1935); so S-spun, etc.
9. [Initial letter of slow.] s-process (Astr.): a process thought to occur in giant stars by which heavy atomic nuclei are produced from other nuclei over a long time scale by a combination of neutron captures and more rapid beta decays.
10. S meter: a meter on a radio that indicates the strength of a received signal.
11. S-matrix (Physics): a scattering matrix, i.e. a matrix of probability amplitudes that occurs in the expression of the initial wave functions in a scattering process in terms of all the possible final wave functions. [After G. matrix S (W. Heisenberg 1943, in Zeitschr. f. Physik CXX. 521).]
12. S-band: the range of microwave frequencies between 1550 and 5200 megahertz, used for radio communication and radar.
13. Chem. [Abbrev. of L. sinister left.] S is used to designate (compounds having) a configuration about an asymmetric carbon atom in which the substituents, placed in order according to certain rules, form an anticlockwise sequence when viewed from a particular direction. Opp. R III. 6.
14. S denotes the strangeness quantum number of sub-atomic particles.
15. Particle Physics. [Repr. strange; also understood as = singlet or sideways.
‘The letters u and d stood for “up” and “down” (that is to say, isotopic spin projection up and down) and s stood for “strange”, with “singlet” (isotopic spin singlet) as a supplementary meaning. “Sideways” was a joke that I used from time to time.’{em}M. Gell-Mann, let. to R.W.B.]
s is used to designate one of the three quarks originally postulated by Gell-Mann, viz. the ‘strange’ quark, which has zero isospin and charge -.
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a gramophone its corrugated trumpet silver handle
spinning dog. such faithfulness it hear
it make you sick.
-kamau brathwaite
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