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La- La
- Lanthanum is a soft, ductile, white metallic element which oxidises rapidly in air.
- Lacquer
- A fast-drying usually clear coating that is highly flammable and dries by solvent evaporation only.
- LAE
- Abbreviation for sound exposure level.
- LAeqT
- There are a number of different noise criteria measurements used by local authorities to determine noise levels in the community.
- Lagrangian Points
- In a system of two large bodies (Sun-Earth or Earth-Moon), these are the points
where a small third body will keep a fixed position relative to the other two.
- lambda
- A letter of the Greek alphabet.
- Lamberts Laws
- The illuminance on a surface illuminated by light falling on it perpendicularly from a point source is proportional to the inverse square of the distance between the surface and the source.
- Lance-Wood
- An elastic wood suitable where some degree of bending is required.
- Land
- That surface on the periphery of a rotary cutting tool, such as a milling cutter, drill, tap, or reamer, which joins the face of the flute or tooth to make up the basic cutting edge.
- Landauer′s Principle
- A principle which states that it doesn′t explicitly take energy to compute data.
- Landfill Site
- A carefully designed structure built into or on top of the ground in which rubbish is isolated from the surrounding environment.
- Lanthanum
- A soft, ductile, white metallic element which oxidises rapidly in air.
- Lap
- A tool made of soft metal and charged with fine abrasives for precision finishing of metal surfaces.
- Lap Joint
- A joint between two overlapping members.
- Laplace Transform
- The Laplace transform is used to convert certain types of inital value problems into
algebra problems.
- Laplacian
- The divergence of a gradient.
- Lapping
- A surface finishing operation used to achieve a fine polish and close tolerances.
- Lapse Rate
- The rate at which temperature decreases with height in the atmosphere.
- Larch
- An extremely durable wood used for rough work. It warps a lot when dried, but can be polished to a fine finish when dry.
- Lard Oil
- An oil made from animal fats usually mixed with mineral oils to reduce its cost and improve its qualities. Used in engineering as a cutting oil.
- Laser
- An acronym for light amplification by stimulated emission of radiation.
- Laser Diode
- A laser which uses a forward biased semiconductor junction as the active medium.
- Laser Vibrometer
- A sensing system which uses laser beams to measure the motion of a vibrating surface.
- Latent Heat
- The amount of heat required to melt (or vapourize) 1 kilogram of a substance.
- Lathe
- A machine tool which spins a block of material to perform various operations to create an object which has symmetry about an axis of rotation.
- Latin Square
- An n by n array of numbers in which only n numbers appear. No number appears more than once in any row or column.
- Latitude
- The angular distance of a point on the Earth from the equator.
- Latten
- Elizabethan term for brass, probably of Dutch origin.
- Lattice
- An orderly arrangement of atoms in a material.
- Lattice Parameter
- The combination of unit cell edge lengths and interaxial angles that defines the unit cell geometry.
- Lattice Point
- A point with integer coordinates.
- Laue Pattern
- The pattern produced on a photographic film when high-frequency electromagnetic waves are fired at a crystalline solid.
- Laughing Gas
- Nitrous oxide, an anaesthetic.
- Law of Areas
- Kepler′s second law states: Each planet moves in such a way that the imaginary line joining it to the sun sweeps out equal areas in equal times.
- Law of Parsimony
- The suggestion that the simpler a theory is, the better it is.
- Lawrencium
- The only known isotope has a half life of 8 seconds.
- Lawson Criterion
- A criterion specifying the product of density and confinement time required to satisfy some power balance condition in a fusion reactor.
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