integrating factor

noun

Mathematics.

1. a factor that upon multiplying a differential equation with the right-hand side equal to zero makes the equation integrable, usually by making the resulting expression an exact differential of some function.

Word History and Origins

Origin of integrating factor¹

First recorded in 1855–60

Example Sentences

Department of Health and Human Services should develop "a public population-based approach to dealing with pain as the singularly important integrating factor," Pizzo said.

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"It is necessary to turn the Communist Party into the integrating factor of all centrist forces," he says.

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He has lost the integrating factor—the moral—which binds human personality together.

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Profoundly subjective, deeply individual, unique and irrepeatable, human sexuality has meaning only to the extent that it remains an integrating factor, relating individual destiny to that of the species.

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