0%

alpha particle

al·pha par·ti·cle
A a

Transcription

    • US Pronunciation
    • US IPA
    • [al-fuh pahr-ti-kuh l]
    • /ˈæl fə ˈpɑr tɪ kəl/
    • US Pronunciation
    • US IPA
    • [al-fuh pahr-ti-kuh l]
    • /ˈæl fə ˈpɑr tɪ kəl/

Definitions of alpha particle words

  • noun alpha particle a helium-4 nucleus, containing two neutrons and two protons, emitted during some radioactive transformations 3
  • noun alpha particle a positively charged particle given off by certain radioactive substances: it consists of two protons and two neutrons (a helium nucleus), and is converted into an atom of helium by the acquisition of two electrons 3
  • abbreviation Technical meaning of ALPHA PARTICLE bit rot 3
  • noun alpha particle a positively charged particle consisting of two protons and two neutrons, emitted in radioactive decay or nuclear fission; the nucleus of a helium atom. 1
  • noun Technical meaning of alpha particle (jargon)   A hypothetical disease the existence of which has been deduced from the observation that unused programs or features will often stop working after sufficient time has passed, even if "nothing has changed". The theory explains that bits decay as if they were radioactive. As time passes, the contents of a file or the code in a program will become increasingly garbled. People with a physics background tend to prefer the variant "bit decay" for the analogy with particle decay. There actually are physical processes that produce such effects (alpha particles generated by trace radionuclides in ceramic chip packages, for example, can change the contents of a computer memory unpredictably, and various kinds of subtle media failures can corrupt files in mass storage), but they are quite rare (and computers are built with error detection circuitry to compensate for them). The notion long favoured among hackers that cosmic rays are among the causes of such events turns out to be a myth. Bit rot is the notional cause of software rot. See also computron, quantum bogodynamics. 1
  • noun alpha particle physics: positively-charged particle 1

Information block about the term

Origin of alpha particle

First appearance:

before 1900
One of the 17% newest English words
First recorded in 1900-05

Historical Comparancy

Parts of speech for Alpha particle

noun
adjective
verb
adverb
pronoun
preposition
conjunction
determiner
exclamation

alpha particle popularity

This term is known only to a narrow circle of people with rare knowledge. Only 5% of English native speakers know the meaning of this word.
According to our data most of word are more popular. This word is almost not used. It has a much more popular synonym.

alpha particle usage trend in Literature

This diagram is provided by Google Ngram Viewer

See also

Matching words

Was this page helpful?
Yes No
Thank you for your feedback! Tell your friends about this page
Tell us why?