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vortex ring

noun
  1. a stable perturbation in a fluid that takes the form of a torus in which the flow rotates in the section of the torus so that the pressure difference between the inside and outside of the torus balances body forces. The best-known vortex ring is a smoke ring
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Collins English Dictionary - Complete & Unabridged 2012 Digital Edition © William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1979, 1986 © HarperCollins Publishers 1998, 2000, 2003, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2009, 2012

Examples from the Web for vortex ring

Historical Examples

  • Through a vortex-ring or tube, the fluid circulates in closed lines of flow, each one of which is laced through the tube.

    Lord Kelvin

    Andrew Gray

  • A vortex-ring produced in the air behaves in the most surprising manner.

    The Machinery of the Universe

    Amos Emerson Dolbear

  • Such a vortex-ring is made by the smoker who purses his lips into a round hole and sends out a puff of smoke.

  • Now this is just what a vortex-ring would do in an incompressible frictionless fluid.

  • It is certainly possible roughly to conceive how such a structure as a vortex-ring in the ether might be formed.

    The Machinery of the Universe

    Amos Emerson Dolbear