CENTRIFUGAL • DICTIONARY ONE.COM • Definition of Centrifugal

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/sˈɛntrɪfjˌugəl/ Listen

adjective

Centrifugal adj.

1.

Tending, or causing, to recede from the center.

2.

(Bot.)

(a)

Expanding first at the summit, and later at the base, as a flower cluster.

(b)

Having the radicle turned toward the sides of the fruit, as some embryos.

Centrifugal force (Mech.), a force whose direction is from a center. Note: When a body moves in a circle with uniform velocity, a force must act on the body to keep it in the circle without change of velocity. The direction of this force is towards the center of the circle. If this force is applied by means of a string to the body, the string will be in a state of tension. To a person holding the other end of the string, this tension will appear to be directed toward the body as if the body had a tendency to move away from the center of the circle which it is describing. Hence this latter force is often called centrifugal force. The force which really acts on the body being directed towards the center of the circle is called centripetal force, and in some popular treatises the centripetal and centrifugal forces are described as opposing and balancing each other. But they are merely the different aspects of the same stress.

Centrifugal impression (Physiol.), an impression (motor) sent from a nerve center outwards to a muscle or muscles by which motion is produced.

Centrifugal machine, A machine for expelling water or other fluids from moist substances, or for separating liquids of different densities by centrifugal action; a whirling table.

Centrifugal pump, a machine in which water or other fluid is lifted and discharged through a pipe by the energy imparted by a wheel or blades revolving in a fixed case. Some of the largest and most powerful pumps are of this kind.

noun

Centrifugal n. A centrifugal machine.

See images of 'Centrifugal'

Etymology of 'Centrifugal'

Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48

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"Centrifugal" Quotes from Famous Books

... self-development whereby the seeker for union is enabled to perceive the shining of the Inward Light. This is achieved by daily discipline in stilling the mind and directing the consciousness inward instead of outward. The Self is within, and the mind, which is normally centrifugal, must first be arrested, controlled, and then turned back upon itself, and held with perfect steadiness. All this is naively expressed in the Upanishads in the passage, "The Self-existent pierced the openings of the senses so that they turn forward, not backward ...

— Architecture and Democracy • Claude Fayette Bragdon

... are sometimes snatched up by a mighty belt in a machine shop; he seemed simply to snap in the remorseless grasp. Bill himself had no sensation of his enemy's weight. He had him about the knees by now, Joe's body thrust out almost straight from centrifugal force, and with a terrific wrench of his mighty shoulders Bill ...

— The Snowshoe Trail • Edison Marshall

... However, in all this, man never witnesses more than necessary effects, flowing from the nature of things, which, whilst that remains the same, can never be opposed with propriety. These effects are owing to gravitation, attraction, centrifugal power, &c. ...

— The System of Nature, Vol. 1 • Baron D'Holbach

... only gradually that the community was Anglicized. Under the sway of centrifugal impulses, the wealthier members began to form new colonies, moulting their old feathers and replacing them by finer, and flying ever further from the centre. Men of organizing ability founded unrivalled ...

— Children of the Ghetto • I. Zangwill

... The centrifugal paths from the motor speech-center to the motor nerves of speech and to their extremities, or else these nerves themselves, are injured. Then occurs dysarthria, and, if the path is totally impassable ...

— The Mind of the Child, Part II • W. Preyer

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