Crossword clues for insulator
Longman Dictionary of Contemporary English
The Collaborative International Dictionary
Insulator \In"su*la`tor\, n.
One who, or that which, insulates.
(Elec. & Thermotics) A substance or object that insulates; a nonconductor; as, polyurethane foam is a popular thermal insulator.
Douglas Harper's Etymology Dictionary
1801, agent noun in Latin form from insulate.
Wiktionary
n. 1 A substance that does not transmit heat (''thermal insulator''), sound (''acoustic insulator'') or electricity (''electrical insulator''). 2 Image:Ceramic electric insulator.jpg A non-conductive structure, coating or device that does not transmit sound, heat or electricity (see image)
WordNet
n. a material such as glass or porcelain with negligible electrical or thermal conductivity [syn: dielectric, nonconductor] [ant: conductor]
Wikipedia
An electrical insulator is a material whose internal electric charges do not flow freely, and therefore make it nearly impossible to conduct an electric current under the influence of an electric field. This contrasts with other materials, semiconductors and conductors, which conduct electric current more easily. The property that distinguishes an insulator is its resistivity; insulators have higher resistivity than semiconductors or conductors.
A perfect insulator does not exist, because even insulators contain small numbers of mobile charges ( charge carriers) which can carry current. In addition, all insulators become electrically conductive when a sufficiently large voltage is applied that the electric field tears electrons away from the atoms. This is known as the breakdown voltage of an insulator. Some materials such as glass, paper and Teflon, which have high resistivity, are very good electrical insulators. A much larger class of materials, even though they may have lower bulk resistivity, are still good enough to prevent significant current from flowing at normally used voltages, and thus are employed as insulation for electrical wiring and cables. Examples include rubber-like polymers and most plastics.
Insulators are used in electrical equipment to support and separate electrical conductors without allowing current through themselves. An insulating material used in bulk to wrap electrical cables or other equipment is called insulation. The term insulator is also used more specifically to refer to insulating supports used to attach electric power distribution or transmission lines to utility poles and transmission towers. They support the weight of the suspended wires without allowing the current to flow through the tower to ground.
An insulator is a genetic boundary element that blocks the interaction between enhancers and promoters.
It is thought that an insulator must reside between the enhancer and promoter to inhibit their subsequent interactions. Insulators therefore determine the set of genes an enhancer can influence. The need for insulators arises where two adjacent genes on a chromosome have very different transcription patterns; it is critical that the inducing or repressing mechanisms of one do not interfere with the neighbouring gene. Insulators have also been found to cluster at the boundaries of topological association domains (TADs) and may have a role in partitioning the genome into "chromosome neighborhoods" - genomic regions within which regulation occurs.
Insulator activity is thought to occur primarily through the 3D structure of DNA mediated by proteins including CTCF.
Insulator may refer to:
- Insulator (electricity), a substance that resists electricity
- Insulator (genetics), an element in the genetic code
- Thermal insulation, a material used to resist the flow of heat
- Building insulation, a material used in building construction to prevent heat loss
- Mott insulator, a type of electrical insulator
- Topological insulator, a material that behaves as an insulator in its interior while permitting the movement of charges on its boundary
Usage examples of "insulator".
It is also proposed to test various kinds of insulation and insulators in this laboratory, and to determine the durability of such insulation in the presence of such corrosive gases and water as are found in mines.
The bioengineered bark, a better insulator than most commercial materials, was still on it, and it had been roofed over with a curving slab of more tree.
Doing a Houdini, I adjusted my head to try and get a good viewing angle, pressing it right up against the iron bars, the hat working as a perfect insulator for my head.
The light moved over power lines, insulators and transformers, paused at one charge of plastic explosive, then followed the wires to the timing device.
Stumbling over broken stone and broken metal, he came at last to a barrier of woven wire with sharp-spiked strands strung on insulators along the top, too tall and cruel for him to climb.
Then, suspecting as I had that at least one scout ship would return for a final round-up, they had investigated the properties, of the anthropometer and found out about the only insulator, berrillit blue.
The dark box was obviously the jacket, which was made of wood, with here and there a glass-covered inspection window, or a tube which entered from another gadget, or an insulator for a wire.
The new insulators can hold a gun magazine at one degree Kelvin for weeks, and carry enough fissionable pellets to give rapid fire, with the effect of a steady beam, for more than a minute.
Thankfully the black silicon covering his skin was an effective insulator, otherwise he would have been either roasted, frozen, or electrocuted long ago.
Without insulators, maximum signal distances are a few miles and only that in good weather.
Beneath blue halogen lamps, I saw huge metal tubs ten feet high, and fat ceramic insulators thick as a man’.
Beneath blue halogen lamps, I saw huge metal tubs ten feet high, and fat ceramic insulators thick as a mans leg.
And those insulators, though you can't see them, are commercial diamonds because of their useful heat conductivity.
Whereas before his ideas had been opposed on the grounds of space being a mathematically idealized insulator, now the criticism was that he couldn't be right because the space he described was assumed to be a perfect conductor.
I found some interesting things while I was doing all this: a home-made astrolabe I'd carved, a box containing the folded-flat parts for a scale model of the defences around Byzantium, the remains of my collection of telegraph-pole insulators, and some old jotters from when my father was teaching me French.