Online dictionaryOnline dictionary
Synonyms, antonyms, pronunciation

  Home
English Dictionary      examples: 'day', 'get rid of', 'New York Bay'




Specific gravity   /spəsˈɪfɪk grˈævəti/   Listen
Specific gravity

noun
1.
The density of a substance relative to the density of water.






WordNet 3.0 © 2010 Princeton University








Advanced search
     Find words:
Starting with
Ending with
Containing
Matching a pattern  

Synonyms
Antonyms
Quotes
Words linked to  

only single words



Share |
Add this dictionary
to your browser search bar





"Specific gravity" Quotes from Famous Books



... various liquids and transparent solids (thirteen in number, including spring, rain, and salt water; Spanish and Rhenish wine; vinegar; spirits of wine; oils and glass). The angle of incidence is 30 in each case; also the specific gravity of each substance is given. Then he discusses the reason why refraction takes place. Promises to write on the Rainbow; but will merely say at present that it is to be explained by the reflection on the concave superficies and the refraction at ...
— Thomas Hariot • Henry Stevens

... much as I am," said Stacy, "that this good fortune is rather crowding to us three alone. For myself, I know," he continued, with a backward glance towards a blanketed, covered pile in the corner of the cabin, "that I feel rather oppressed by—by its specific gravity, I calculate—and sort of crampy and twitchy in the legs, as if I ought to 'lite' out and do something, and yet it holds me here. All the same, I doubt if anybody will come up—except from curiosity. Our luck has made ...
— The Three Partners • Bret Harte

... with the hand, and the process of rotation renewed until the whole of the sand is taken away, and the gold alone remains. It is found in very minute scales, and, unless I had been assured to the contrary, I should have taken it to be mica, for, knowing the gold to be of greater specific gravity than the sand, I imagined that a stream of water would remove the latter and leave the former; but here the practice is to remove the whole of the sand by the hand. This process was, no doubt, a profitable ...
— Missionary Travels and Researches in South Africa - Journeys and Researches in South Africa • David Livingstone

... full, and, piling up his raiment on the floor, jumped in. Displacing a large quantity of water, equal to his own bulk, he thereupon solved the question of specific gravity, and, forgetting his bill, forgetting his clothes, he sailed up Sixteenth street and all over Syracuse, clothed in shimmering sunlight and a plain gold ring, shouting "Eureka!" He ran head-first into a Syracuse ...
— Remarks • Bill Nye

... should be for the worse. We are floating on a sea of beneficence, in which it is impossible for us to sink. But though one could not easily drown in the Dead Sea, one might starve. And when goodness is of too great specific gravity it is impossible to get on in it or out of it. This is disconcerting to one of an active disposition. It is comforting to be told that everything is completely good, till you reflect that that is only another way of saying that nothing can be made any better, and that there ...
— Humanly Speaking • Samuel McChord Crothers

... leaves or membranes, and rolled masses. It offers no indications of internal structure, but, on being separated by mechanical violence, exhibits a hackly fracture. Its colour comprises various shades of gold yellow. Its specific gravity varies from 14.8 to 19.2. It is commonly alloyed by copper, silver, and iron, in very small proportions. I mean, if I may say so, to unalloy it"; and, swinging the pick round his head with a dexterity that testified ...
— Punch, Or The London Charivari, Vol. 100. March 7, 1891. • Various

... Erebus, Captain Ross, and the Terror, Captain Crozier, and left England on the 29th of September, 1839. During the outward voyage to Australia, scientific observation was daily and sedulously attended to; experiments were made on the temperature and specific gravity of the sea; geological and geographical investigations were made at all available points, especially at Kerguelen's Land; and both here, as well as during the expedition, magnetic observation and experiment formed a specific subject of attention. ...
— The Economist - Volume 1, No. 3 • Various

... by which the air could be brought into close contact with the absorbing blood vessels. Such a bag, broadly speaking, most of the fishes possess in their floating-bladder: a bag of gas, by compressing or expanding which they alter their specific gravity in the water. In some fishes it is double; in some it is supplied with blood-vessels; in some it is connected by a tube with the gullet, ...
— The Story of Evolution • Joseph McCabe

... linen thread and cloth, yarn, twist, string fabric, and lace. In its composition it is almost purely an unlignified cellulose, and its specific gravity is 1.5. ...
— Textiles • William H. Dooley

... interval. He complained that no considerable advance had made in geometry beyond Euclid, without taking any notice of what had been done by Archimedes and Apollonius. He saw the importance of determining accurately the specific gravity of different substances, and himself attempted to form a table of them by a rude process of his own, without knowing of the more scientific though still imperfect methods previously employed by Archimedes, Ghetaldus,[123] ...
— A Budget of Paradoxes, Volume I (of II) • Augustus De Morgan

... among the rarest of fossils, due, no doubt, to their aerial habits removing them from the ordinary dangers of flood, bog, or ice which overwhelm mammals and reptiles, and also to their small specific gravity which keeps them floating on the surface of water till devoured. Their remains were long confined to Tertiary deposits, where many living genera and a few extinct forms have been found. The only birds yet known from the older rocks are the toothed birds (Odontornithes) of the Cretaceous ...
— Darwinism (1889) • Alfred Russel Wallace

... it, upstairs, and found that the trifle weighed over half a pound. Considering its very small bulk, this worked out to be a specific gravity of 192.6 or almost ten times as heavy as the same bulk of pure gold. ...
— The Blind Spot • Austin Hall and Homer Eon Flint

... Specific Gravity, 3-3.2. Hardness, 5-6. Streak, uncolored.... Fine radiated olive-green crystals are ...
— History and Comprehensive Description of Loudoun County, Virginia • James W. Head

... accumulated from c to e. Now, water in motion can exert this levelling power on similar materials more easily than air, for almost all stones lose in water more than a third of the weight which they have in air, the specific gravity of rocks being in general as 2 1/2 when compared to that of water, which is estimated at 1. But the buoyancy of sand or mud would be still greater in the sea, as the density of salt-water ...
— The Student's Elements of Geology • Sir Charles Lyell

... less than four stone. Now, if we reduce four stone into drachms we shall find the condor is 14,336 times as heavy as the humming-bird. What an amazing disproportion of weight! Yet by the same mechanical use of its wings the condor can overcome the specific gravity of its body with as much ease as the little humming-bird. But this is not all. We are informed that this enormous bird possesses a power in its wings, so far exceeding what is necessary for its own conveyance through the air, that it can take up and fly away with a whole sheer in its talons, ...
— A History of Aeronautics • E. Charles Vivian

... excess, supplying a useful check to his zeal—for zeal uncurbed is very bad. He was a wise and beneficent dictator; and government under such a one can not be improved upon. His manner was gracious, frank and open, and such was the specific gravity of his nature that his words carried weight, ...
— Little Journeys To the Homes of the Great, Volume 3 (of 14) • Elbert Hubbard

... parenchyma of the lungs, that organ commences the formation of carbon; thus increasing the amount originally deposited. Dr Brockmann sets forth, as grounds for this view, that "if the parenchyma of the lungs were filled with carbonaceous dust, their specific gravity ought to be increased; but this is not the case. A completely melanosed lung swims in water, both as a whole and when cut into parts." It is very evident from these remarks, that the author has not seen the disease as it is exhibited in the third division of morbid ...
— An Investigation into the Nature of Black Phthisis • Archibald Makellar

... specific gravity of the blood and other fluids of the body; (2) to preserve the tissues from disorganization and putrefaction; (3) to enter into the composition of the teeth and bones. These are only a few of the uses of salts in the body, but are sufficient ...
— Public School Domestic Science • Mrs. J. Hoodless

... brake; the temperature of the water, by a standard thermometer; and that of the escaping gases, by a pyrometer. The gas itself was analyzed; and its heating power calculated, from its composition, as 617.5[theta]. Its specific gravity was .464; and the volume of air was about seven times that of the gas used (or one-eighth of the mixture), and was only 111/2 per cent. by weight more than was needed for perfect combustion. The results arrived at were ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 508, September 26, 1885 • Various

... sand into his pan, which was a broad, shallow dish of sheet iron. Then water was dipped into the pan until it was full, when he whirled it swiftly about and up and down. This allowed the gold, on account of its greater specific gravity, to fall to the bottom, while the sand itself was floated off by the agitation. Tim had learned the knack of dipping the pan sideways, so as gradually to get rid of the worthless stuff, while the heavy yellow particles ...
— Klondike Nuggets - and How Two Boys Secured Them • E. S. Ellis

... essential forces with which to put each other in motion, and thus are themselves a source of life. Matter immediately begins to strive to fashion itself. The scattered elements of a denser kind, by means of their attraction, gather from a sphere around them all the matter of less specific gravity; again, these elements themselves, together with the material which they have united with them, collect in those points where the particles of a still denser kind are found; these in like manner join still denser particles, and so on. If we follow in ...
— A History of Science, Volume 3(of 5) • Henry Smith Williams

... a Pear is composed differs from that of the apple in containing minute stony concretions which make it, in many varieties of the fruit, bite short and crisp; and its specific gravity is therefore greater than that of the apple, so much so that by taking a cube of each of equal size, that of the Pear will sink when thrown into a vessel of water, while that of the apple will float. ...
— Herbal Simples Approved for Modern Uses of Cure • William Thomas Fernie

... of facts obtained by experiment and observation, aided by mathematical discussion. It enforced the principle that the true method of studying Nature is by experimental interrogation. The researches of Archimedes in specific gravity, and the works of Ptolemy on optics, resemble our present investigations in experimental philosophy, and stand in striking contrast with the speculative vagaries of the older writers. Laplace says that the only observation ...
— History of the Conflict Between Religion and Science • John William Draper

... rapid growth after a victory. That is the temporary vanity of torrents swelled by a storm. Civilized people, especially in our day, are neither elevated nor abased by the good or bad fortune of a captain. Their specific gravity in the human species results from something more than a combat. Their honor, thank God! their dignity, their intelligence, their genius, are not numbers which those gamblers, heroes and conquerors, can put in the lottery of battles. Often a battle is lost and progress is conquered. There is less ...
— Les Miserables - Complete in Five Volumes • Victor Hugo

... balance. The merchant was astonished, and began to regard him with other eyes. Zadig, finding he had raised his curiosity, increased it still further by acquainting him with many things that related to commerce, the specific gravity of metals, and commodities under an equal bulk; the properties of several useful animals; and the means of rendering those useful that are not naturally so. At last Setoc began to consider Zadig as a sage, and preferred him to his companion, whom he had formerly ...
— Library of the World's Best Mystery and Detective Stories • Edited by Julian Hawthorne

... transparent than paper of the same thickness. A thin transverse section placed under the microscope exhibits a series of curvilinear lines diverging from the centre and interlacing each other with great regularity and beauty, closely resembling in appearance the engine-turning of a watch. It possesses a specific gravity varying from 1.888 in the tooth of the walrus, to 2.843 in that of the elephant. Its mean gravity is therefore about two and a half times greater than water. The best, finest, and most valuable ivory is that obtained from the African elephant. When recently cut, it exhibits something ...
— Chambers' Edinburgh Journal, No. 421, New Series, Jan. 24, 1852 • Various

... contentedly smoking our pipes; and, Englishmen like, settled the affairs of nations over a glass of rum and water—ever and anon drinking a health to each friend and fair, who rose uppermost in our thoughts. From this the subject turned to "specific gravity." Here an argument commenced. When illustrating a position I had advanced, by the ascension of the smoke from my pipe, we both turned up our eyes to witness its progress upwards: on looking towards the aperture in the roof what was our astonishment ...
— Lecture On The Aborigines Of Newfoundland • Joseph Noad

... in the yard to the talk of four naval men acting as a Board of Inspection; was able to give details of the machining of enormous processed plates to sizes determined by templates, the length of pan-headed rivets, the specific gravity of an average cubic foot, the scarfing of edges, the accumulation of prepared material. The wooden half-model, he said, was a one-ninety-sixth, instead of the usual one-forty-eighth; yet, even so, it was 5 ...
— The Lord of the Sea • M. P. Shiel

... which are known as Babcock milk bottles, and are registered to show the per cent. of fat in milk. A certain amount of milk is mixed with a certain amount of Commercial Sulphuric acid of a specific gravity 1.83 which is added by degrees and thoroughly shaken up with the milk. Enough distilled water is added to fill the bottle. The mixture is then centrifuged in a Babcock Centrifuge, and the centrifuged fat read in per cent. on the neck of ...
— How Girls Can Help Their Country • Juliette Low

... conditions, the law, namely, that anything will float which bulk for bulk is lighter than the volume of water displaced by it, so that by including in our calculations the displacement of the vessel as well as the specific gravity of the material, we now make iron float by the very same law by which it sinks. This example shows that the function of the Personal Factor is to analyze the manifestations of Law which are spontaneously afforded by Nature and to discover the Universal Affirmative Principle which lies hidden ...
— The Creative Process in the Individual • Thomas Troward

... if any reliance can be placed on the concurrent traditions of all religions, Pagan as well as Christian, supported by wide-spread popular belief, the high mental exaltation induced by religious abstraction, and also by other vehement affections of the mind, is actually attended with a diminished specific gravity. Of alleged ecclesiastical miracles of this kind it is better to say nothing. The Roman Catholic and the Hindoo devotees equally claim for their adepts in religious contemplation an exemption from (among other earthly liabilities) the hindrance of weight. In the rapture of prayer, ...
— The International Monthly Magazine - Volume V - No II • Various

... increased amount and frequent passage of urine. From the normal quantity of from 2 to 3 pints in the 24 hours it may be increased to 10, 20 or 30 pints, or even more. It is usually of pale colour, and of thicker consistence than normal urine, possesses a decidedly sweet taste, and is of high specific gravity (1030 to 1050). It frequently gives rise to considerable irritation of ...
— Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 8, Slice 3 - "Destructors" to "Diameter" • Various

... The specific gravity of air is 1/823 that of water. How does this fact affect the weight of the material which each can carry at the ...
— The Elements of Geology • William Harmon Norton

... I understand the relative quantities of heat in bodies at the same temperature, just as by specific gravity I understand the relative quantities of matter in bodies of the same bulk. Equal weights of quicksilver and water at the same temperature do not contain the same quantities of heat, any more than equal bulks of those liquids contain ...
— A Catechism of the Steam Engine • John Bourne

... readily seen that the use of metal, even aluminum, for the framework, is prohibited by its weight. While aluminum has double the strength of spruce wood it is vastly heavier, and thus the advantage it has in strength is overbalanced many times by its weight. The specific gravity of aluminum is 2.50; that ...
— Flying Machines - Construction and Operation • W.J. Jackman and Thos. H. Russell

... The specific gravity of the spirit upon his globe is not so great, comparatively, as that of man in the natural world. He can rise in his native air with little difficulty, and can dart with unerring accuracy upon the magnetic current flowing from the spirit world to ...
— Strange Visitors • Henry J. Horn

... inner light. They have tried short cuts to fame and fortune, and have not been willing to pay the price in self-denial that all worthy success demands. We find our position in life according to the specific gravity of our moral ...
— The Last Harvest • John Burroughs

... not be surprised That the vessel capsized, Or that Blogg, who had made, from intestine commotions, His specific gravity less than the Ocean's, Should go floating away, 'Mid the surges and spray, Like a cork in a gutter, which, swoll'n by a shower, Runs down Holborn-hill about nine ...
— The Humourous Poetry of the English Language • James Parton

... to 1.7 on Continuous Discharge. Why a Battery May Safely be Discharged to a Lower Voltage Than 1.7 Volts per Cell at High Rates of Discharge. Why Battery Voltage, Measured on "Open Circuit" is of Little Value. Changes in the Density of the Electrolyte. Why Specific Gravity Readings of the Electrolyte Show the State of Charge of a Cell. Conditions Which Make Specific Gravity Readings Unreliable. Why the Specific Gravity of the Electrolyte Falls During Discharge. Why the Discharge of a Battery Is Stopped When the Specific Gravity Has Dropped to 1.150. ...
— The Automobile Storage Battery - Its Care And Repair • O. A. Witte

... of jasmine. If the pomade is used, it must be cut up fine previously to being put into the spirit; if the oil is used, it must be shaken well together every two or more hours, otherwise, on account of its specific gravity, the oil separates, and but little surface is exposed to the spirit. After the extract is strained off, the "washed" pomatum or oil is still useful, if remelted, in the composition of pomatum for the hair, and gives more satisfaction to a customer than ...
— The Art of Perfumery - And Methods of Obtaining the Odors of Plants • G. W. Septimus Piesse

... since each substance always has, when pure, the same specific gravity, we have here a means of distinguishing precious stones. It is very seldom, if ever, the case that we find any two precious stones of the same specific gravity. A few stones have nearly the same specific gravities, and in such cases it is well to apply other tests also. In fact one should always make sure of a stone by seeing that two or three different tests point to the ...
— A Text-Book of Precious Stones for Jewelers and the Gem-Loving Public • Frank Bertram Wade



Words linked to "Specific gravity" :   relative density



Copyright © 2024 Dictionary One.com