semiform

plural semiforms

1. A partial or imperfect form.

   The semiform is covered with a thermoplastic bar preheated in a special chamber up to superelastic state .

   1990, Dhanjoo N. Ghista, Clinical Cardiac Assessment, Interventions, and Assist Technology, page 152

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   For seventeen years he had kept death at bay, and, at the time I speak of, medical diagnosis revealed that but one lung supported his remnant of life; thet that semiform of life seemed equal to the prime of many a hale man .

   1880, Horace Bushnell, Mary A. Bushnell Cheney, Life and Letters of Horace Bushnell, page 531

   Prior to that it was in a semiform state for 2 years, semiform state being that various groups have gotten together to say there should be a committee, so that would be approximately 5 years' life to the committee.

   1969, United States. Congress. House, Hearings - Volume 7, page 649

2. chemistryA crystal structure that is more elaborate than the simplest (primitive) form but which does not include all the faces and symmetry elements characteristic of the full crystal system.

   This semiform π (312) is again to be observed on crystal No. 13, though it is there represented by only a single face.

   1882, L. Fletcher, “Crystallographic Notes”, in London, Edinburgh and Dublin Philosophical Magazine and Journal of Science (Supplement), volume 13, page 479

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   As crystals of tourmaline do not rotate the plane of polarisation, it is probable that in the case of the present crystal the hemimorphic development is of a semiform, similar to those which have been observed on dioptase and apatite, and that the form should be designated crystallographically as υκπ {320}.

   1886, R. H. Solly, “On the Tetartohedral Development of a Crystal of Tourmaline”, in The Mineralogical Magazine and Journal of the Mineralogical Society, volume 6, page 81

   The eight normals of the tetragonal scalenohedron may carry the eight faces of a semiform in other ways than asymmetrically as regards the systematic planes.

   1895, Nevil Story-Maskelyne, Crystallography: A Treatise on the Morphology of Crystals, page 255