self-gravitatingadj.
/ˌsɛlfˈɡravᵻteɪtɪŋ/, U.S. /ˌsɛlfˈɡrævəˌteɪdɪŋ/ΚΠ
1860 Stratford Times 30 Mar. A company has been formed in Manchester for the purpose of recovering sunken vessels by means of self-gravitating air cylinders.
1912 Classif. Bull. (U.S. Patent Office) No. 28. 24/1 Wind motors, rotary,..self-gravitating. Motors..in which the wheel support and tail vane are so connected and arranged that they tend by virtue of their own weight to seek one or the other of their two extreme positions of adjustment.
2. Physics and Astronomy. That generates a gravitational field of its own; that experiences or is characterized by self-gravitation (self-gravitation n. 3).
ΚΠ
1901 London, Edinb., & Dublin Philos. Mag. 6th Ser. 2 558 In obtaining (63) we treated the source of the gravitational forces as wholly external to the solid. In a self-gravitating homogeneous spherical ‘earth’ of radius a, we should have [etc.].
1913 Proc. Royal Soc. A. 88 2 The classification of the various forms possible for a self-gravitating rotating planet.
1962 G. B. Field in L. Woltjer Distribution & Motion Interstellar Matter 318 Is the system a self-gravitating one in the sense that the gas acts on the gas, or is it not?
1979 New Scientist 3 May 424/2 A self-gravitating mass of gas, cohering under its self-attraction, would adopt spherical symmetry.
2006 Science 11 Aug. 771/3 Only a small fraction of each molecular cloud actually becomes self-gravitating and forms stars.
This entry has been updated (OED Third Edition, January 2018; most recently modified version published online March 2022).
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adj.1860- church-earth
- church-feuar
- church-forsaker
- church-founder
- church-litten
- church-looking
- church-out
- church-outed
- church-parade
- church-pillow
- church-razing
- church-reforming
- church-respondent
- church-ring
- church-robbing
- church-ruinating
- church-soken
- church-spoiling
- church-state
- church-stifled
- church-tearer
- church-tympanite
- church-wise
- churchandking man
- churchandstatism