WordNet
n. an experiment designed to control for variables affecting the results of another experiment
Usage examples of "control experiment".
The undried jelly was next tried, and as a control experiment small cubes were left in water for four days and retained their angles.
As a control experiment, similar unvarnished and transparent tubes were tried, and they did not prevent the cotyledons bending towards the light.
In physics the chief method for gaining knowledge is the laboratory experiment, by which one manipulates the parameter whose effect is in question, executes parallel control experiments with that parameter held constant, holds other parameters constant throughout, replicates both the experimental manipulation and the control experiment, and obtains quantitative data.
Mars is a control experiment on the influence of oceans and liquid water on atmospheric circulation.
The Galileo mission served as a significant control experiment of the ability of remote-sensing spacecraft to detect life at various stages of evolutionary development on other worlds in the solar system.
He couldn't take the chance that the boulder might keep on rolling forever--that was what he'd been trying to avoid when he performed the control experiment.