Crossword clues for catenary
The Collaborative International Dictionary
Catenary \Cat"e*na*ry\, Catenarian \Cat`e*na"ri*an\, a. [L. catenarius, fr. catena a chain. See Chain.] Relating to a chain; like a chain; as, a catenary curve.
Catenary \Cat"e*na*ry\, n.; pl. Catenaries. (Geol.) The curve formed by a rope or chain of uniform density and perfect flexibility, hanging freely between two points of suspension, not in the same vertical line.
Douglas Harper's Etymology Dictionary
1872, from Latin catenarius "relating to a chain," from catenanus "chained, fettered," from catena "chain, fetter, shackle" (see chain (n.)). As a noun from 1788 in mathematics. Related: Catenarian.
Wiktionary
a. Relating to a chain; like a chain. n. 1 (context geometry English) The curve described by a flexible chain or a rope if it is supported at each end and is acted upon only by no other forces than a uniform gravitational force due to its own weight. 2 (context nautical English) The curve of an anchor cable from the seabed to the vessel; it should be horizontal at the anchor so as to bury the flukes. 3 A system of overhead power lines that provide trains, trolleys, buses, etc., with electricity, having a straight conductor wire and a bowed suspension cable.
WordNet
n. the curve theoretically assumed by a perfectly flexible and inextensible cord of uniform density and cross section hanging freely from two fixed points
Wikipedia
In physics and geometry, a catenary is the curve that an idealized hanging chain or cable assumes under its own weight when supported only at its ends. The curve has a U-like shape, superficially similar in appearance to a parabola, but it is not a parabola: it is a (scaled, rotated) graph of the hyperbolic cosine. The curve appears in the design of certain types of arches and as a cross section of the catenoid—the shape assumed by a soap film bounded by two parallel circular rings.
The catenary is also called the alysoid, chainette, or, particularly in the material sciences, funicular.
Mathematically, the catenary curve is the graph of the hyperbolic cosine function. The surface of revolution of the catenary curve, the catenoid, is a minimal surface, specifically a minimal surface of revolution. The mathematical properties of the catenary curve were first studied by Robert Hooke in the 1670s, and its equation was derived by Leibniz, Huygens and Johann Bernoulli in 1691.
Catenaries and related curves are used in architecture and engineering, in the design of bridges and arches, so that forces do not result in bending moments. In the offshore oil and gas industry, "catenary" refers to a steel catenary riser, a pipeline suspended between a production platform and the seabed that adopts an approximate catenary shape.
Catenary may refer to:
- Catenary, a mathematical curve
- Catenary ring, a type of mathematical ring
- Part of an overhead line system for electric power transmission for railways
Usage examples of "catenary".
The upper rim of the antiship nets stretched in a deep catenary across the river from the titanic windlasses, down-geared and ratcheted, atop Onetower and the northwest garrison on the downstream side, and from Sixtower to the northeast garrison at the easternmost tip of Old Town, almost out of sight around the curve of the island.
I paid out the cord, and when the helicopter was hovering at a safe height, five hundred feet of cord hung down in a graceful catenary curve.
Wanderer one such trajectory was an incandescent catenary in the haze, a cable of blue fire looping into infinity.
Biology, girls' names, catenary curves, and all the rest of the nonsense were wiped out as water is when a squeegee clears a windowpane.
Through it all stretched the paths of the catenaries that fed power to the world’s gates: those lines of power were shadowy now, reflecting the nonfunctional status of the catenaries.
I’m trying to keep track of where the catenaries are going to start bunching together.
I think we’re just going to have to try to sense the catenaries directly or do a wizardry to find them.
And you heard what’s-his-face back there: they’ve been moving the catenaries around.
Then, during some period when everything was running smoothly and there was no reason to expect an intrusion, the catenaries were relocated.
There’s no wall-walking down here, with the interference from the catenaries scattered all around.
Yama could dimly see shapes and catenaries inside their chests and limbs.
The city was fringed with vertical roots which fell from the great supporting catenaries into the everlasting murk of the far-below, pumping life up into the mainroots and thus into the city.
It killed all my ancestors except the very few who, by accident or by grace of the Powers, managed to find their way into the Old Downside and take refuge in the caves there, down where the catenaries spring up from their ultimate power source.
The shallow, lovely catenaries changed to a harsher, more angular figure.
There were paper chains hanging in hyperbolic catenary curves and sinusoids, Gaussian distribution bells, and pendulums wreathed in logarithmic spirals.