quantum

plural quantums · plural quanta

1. South AsiacountableuncountablelawThe total amount of something; quantity.First known use 17th c.

   A certain quantum of power must always exist in the community, in some hands, and under some appellation.

   1790, Edmund Burke, Reflections on the Revolution in France, Oxford, published 2009, page 142

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   The reader will perhaps be curious to know the quantum of this present, but we cannot satisfy his curiosity.

   1749, Henry Fielding, Tom Jones, Folio Society, published 1973, page 416

   Otherwise I will have given the lie to my maxim that whether you work eight or twenty hours, the quantum of work that gets done on a normal day is the same.

   1997, Kiran Nagarkar, Cuckold, HarperCollins, published 2013, page 375

   The Congress's core ministerial panel on Friday gave its green signal to raising motor fuel prices but the quantum of increase emerged as a hitch.

   2008 May 21, The Times of India

   1. South AsiacountableuncountablelawThe amount of compensation awarded to a successful party in a lawsuit.
   2. South AsiacountableuncountablelawThe length or magnitude of the sentence handed down to someone who has been found guilty of a crime.
2. countableuncountableThe amount or quantity observably present, or available.First known use 18th c.

   Each man has only a quantum of compassion, he argued, and mine is used up for the day.

   1979, John Le Carré, Smiley's People, Folio Society, published 2010, page 96

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   The dream of flying, according to Strümpell, is the appropriate image used by the psyche to interpret the quantum of stimulus [translating Reizquantum] proceeding from the rise and fall of the lungs when the cutaneous sensation of the thorax has simultaneously sunk into unconsciousness.

   1999, Sigmund Freud, translated by Joyce Crick, The Interpretation of Dreams, Oxford, published 2008, page 34

3. countableuncountablenatural sciencesThe smallest possible, and therefore indivisible, unit of a given quantity or quantifiable phenomenon.First known use 20th c.

   The quantum of light energy was later called a photon.

   2002, David C Cassidy et al., Understanding Physics, Birkhauser, page 602

4. countableuncountablecomputingThe amount of time allocated for a thread to perform its work in a multithreaded environment.
5. abbreviationellipsisuncountablecomputingEllipsis of quantum computing.

   Developing for quantum has never been more accessible.

6. countableuncountablemedicineThe minimum dose of a pathogen required to cause an infection.
7. countableuncountableeconomicsAmount of goods produced or demanded.
8. countableuncountablemathematicsA definite portion of a manifoldness, limited by a mark or by a boundary.

   Defined parts of a manifoldness are called Quanta

   1882, William Kingdon Clifford, Mathematical Papers

1. not comparableOf a change, sudden or discrete, without intermediate stages.
2. informalnot comparableOf a change, significant.
3. not comparablenatural sciencesInvolving quanta, quantum mechanics or other aspects of quantum physics.

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   Some of the most beautiful and thus appealing physical theories, including quantum electrodynamics and quantum gravity, have been dogged for decades by infinities that erupt when theorists try to prod their calculations into new domains. Getting rid of these nagging infinities has probably occupied far more effort than was spent in originating the theories.

   2012 January 28, Michael Riordan, “Tackling Infinity”, in American Scientist, volume 100, number 1, archived from the original on 19 Jun 2017, page 86

   Antonyms: classical

   1. not comparablecomputingRelating to a quantum computer.

      Antonyms: classical