DICT.TW Dictionary Taiwan
O·val a.
1. Of or pertaining to eggs; done in the egg, or inception; as, oval conceptions. [Obs.]
2. Having the figure of an egg; oblong and curvilinear, with one end broader than the other, or with both ends of about the same breadth; in popular usage, elliptical.
3. Bot. Broadly elliptical.
Oval chuck Mech., a lathe chuck so constructed that work attached to it, and cut by the turning tool in the usual manner, becomes of an oval form.
O·val, n. A body or figure in the shape of an egg, or popularly, of an ellipse.
Cassinian oval Geom., the locus of a point the product of whose distances from two fixed points is constant; -- so called from Cassini, who first investigated the curve. Thus, in the diagram, if P moves so that P A.P B is constant, the point P describes a Cassinian oval. The locus may consist of a single closed line, as shown by the dotted line, or of two equal ovals about the points A and B.
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oval
adj : rounded like an egg [syn: egg-shaped, elliptic, elliptical,
ovate, oviform, ovoid, prolate]
n : a closed plane curve resulting from the intersection of a
circular cone and a plane cutting completely through it;
"the sums of the distances from the foci to any point on
an ellipse is constant" [syn: ellipse]