What's the difference between ideal and optimal?

Ideal


Definition:

  • (a.) Existing in idea or thought; conceptional; intellectual; mental; as, ideal knowledge.
  • (a.) Reaching an imaginary standard of excellence; fit for a model; faultless; as, ideal beauty.
  • (a.) Existing in fancy or imagination only; visionary; unreal.
  • (a.) Teaching the doctrine of idealism; as, the ideal theory or philosophy.
  • (a.) Imaginary.
  • (n.) A mental conception regarded as a standard of perfection; a model of excellence, beauty, etc.

Example Sentences:

  • (1) Acceptance of less than ideal donors is ill-advised even though rejection of such donors conflicts with the current shortage of organs.
  • (2) In platform shoes to emulate Johnson's height, and with the aid of prosthetic earlobes, Cranston becomes the 36th president: he bullies and cajoles, flatters and snarls and barks, tells dirty jokes or glows with idealism as required, and delivers the famous "Johnson treatment" to everyone from Martin Luther King to the racist Alabama governor George Wallace.
  • (3) Propofol is ideal for short periods of care on the ICU, and during weaning when longer acting agents are being eliminated.
  • (4) As bacterial vaginosis is generally looked upon as a mild noninflammatory condition lactate-gel seems to be an ideal treatment for this disease.
  • (5) Using four 4 cm electrodes at intervals of 1.5 cm in VX-2 carcinoma in the rabbit, ideal heating was obtained: 42 degrees C at the periphery of the tumor and 43 degrees C at the center.
  • (6) The regimen used at the Hospital for Sick Children, Toronto, provides 2.0 to 2.5 gm protein per kilogram ideal body weight, plus adequate fluid and nutrient supplements.
  • (7) The ideal prophylaxis should compensate for the undesired effects of an operation or injury on the coagulation system, without subjecting the patient to the danger of elevated tendency to bleed.
  • (8) "The new feminine ideal is of egg-smooth perfection from hairline to toes," she writes, describing the exquisite agony of having her fingers, arms, back, buttocks and nostrils waxed.
  • (9) From a practical viewpoint, this approach to prevention is less than ideal because it results in considerable costs as health care providers monitor for possible hepatotoxic effects and because it is difficult to maintain compliance for 12 months.
  • (10) Ideally, the rule should classify all nonhyperplastic and mildly hyperplastic cases as nonprogressive and all carcinomas as progressive; there were, however, a considerable number of false positives and false negatives based on application of the classification rule to these cases.
  • (11) Whether we would use that to support and amplify the community ideals already present or go the way of gentrification remained to be seen.
  • (12) Gallium arsenide has proved to be an ideal substrate material for some uses but is associated with unique health hazards.
  • (13) The ideal body weight (kg) of each individual can be calculated by the following formula: ideal body mass index x the height (m)2, since body mass index is expressed by the body weight in kilogram divided by the height squared in meters.
  • (14) It's almost starting to feel like we're back in the good old days of July 2005, when Paris lost out to London in the battle to stage the 2012 Olympic Games, a defeat immediately interpreted by France as a bitter blow to Gallic ideals of fair play and non-commercialism and yet another undeserved triumph for the underhand, free-market manoeuvrings of perfidious Albion.
  • (15) Therefore, it is an ideal method for the isolation of cell cycle phase specific populations.
  • (16) Without suggesting an ideal medication for this syndrome, the authors have obtained good results with barbexaclone.
  • (17) Actions achieved or a long commitment to an ideal, often through hardship.
  • (18) The integrated sensing system is an ideal instrumental set up for viewing and recording the behaviour of rodents as well as other animals in the experimental pen throughout the year under varying weather and light conditions.
  • (19) This experiment investigated people's preferences for the location of facilities in an ideal town.
  • (20) Need Score for each content area was calculated by taking the difference between Ideal and Current Expertise responses.

Optimal


Definition:

Example Sentences:

  • (1) The optimal size for stimulation was between 5 degrees and 12 degrees (visual angle).
  • (2) In addition, intravenous injection of complexes into rabbits showed optimal myocardial images with agents of intermediate lipophilicity.
  • (3) More research and a national policy to provide optimal nutrition for all pregnant women, including the adolescent, are needed.
  • (4) A beta-adrenergic receptor cDNA cloned into a eukaryotic expression vector reliably induces high levels of beta-adrenergic receptor expression in 2-12% of COS cell colonies transfected with this plasmid after experimental conditions are optimized.
  • (5) Enhanced sensitivity to ITDs should translate to better-defined azimuthal receptive fields, and therefore may be a step toward achieving an optimal representation of azimuth within the auditory pathway.
  • (6) T cell costimulation by molecules on the antigen presenting cell (APC) is required for optimal T cell proliferation.
  • (7) This optimization resulted in products which are now studied in-vivo.
  • (8) This promotion of repetitive activity by the introduction of additional potassium channels occurred up to an "optimal" value beyond which a further increase in paranodal potassium permeability narrowed the range of currents with a repetitive response.
  • (9) In general, optimal DAGAT activity in vitro was observed when long-chain unsaturated acyl-CoAs and diacylglycerols (DAGs) containing long acyl chains were used as substrates for in vitro TAG synthesis (although 1,2-didecanoin was also very effective).
  • (10) In conclusion, autoimmune thyroiditis in an animal model can be prevented by reducing thyroidal iodine or its metabolism and optimal effects require intervention at the embryonic stage.
  • (11) Research must continue to determine the optimal regimen that suppresses testosterone activity with the least amount of toxicity.
  • (12) We present the analysis both formally and in geometric terms and show how it leads to a general algorithm for the optimization of NMR excitation schemes.
  • (13) The effect of exclusion versus inclusion of the fiducial timing point optimizing routine in the signal averaging program was examined in 21 patients.
  • (14) The nurse is in an optimal position to plan and deliver a program and determine its effectiveness.
  • (15) elution patterns of the adducts formed by DBF metabolites with DNA and obtained in vivo at the optimal exposure time of 42-48 h were qualitatively very similar to the patterns obtained in vitro, but their amplitude was quantitatively reduced.
  • (16) Incubation of the blocked filters with radiolabeled DNA under optimal binding conditions and subsequent autoradiography reveals high-affinity DNA-protein interactions.
  • (17) A technique is therefore described using 3-D images and reconstruction of high-resolution films, which allows rapid examination of the menisci in optimal planes.
  • (18) The data of first 1000 first-born, non-malformed, mature (greater than or equal to 2500 g) offspring of participants in the Hungarian "Optimal" Family Planning Programme were evaluated.
  • (19) Molecular mass of the native enzyme is 560,000 and optimal reaction temperature is 70 degrees C. Km value for ribulose 1,5-bisphosphate is 0.27 mM.
  • (20) Optimal yields of 7-ketolithocholic acid and 7-ketodeoxycholic acid were obtained after 78 h of incubation.