(a.) Highest in rank, authority, character, importance, or degree; most considerable or important; chief; main; as, the principal officers of a Government; the principal men of a state; the principal productions of a country; the principal arguments in a case.
(a.) Of or pertaining to a prince; princely.
(n.) A leader, chief, or head; one who takes the lead; one who acts independently, or who has controlling authority or influence; as, the principal of a faction, a school, a firm, etc.; -- distinguished from a subordinate, abettor, auxiliary, or assistant.
(n.) The chief actor in a crime, or an abettor who is present at it, -- as distinguished from an accessory.
(n.) A chief obligor, promisor, or debtor, -- as distinguished from a surety.
(n.) One who employs another to act for him, -- as distinguished from an agent.
(n.) A thing of chief or prime importance; something fundamental or especially conspicuous.
(n.) A capital sum of money, placed out at interest, due as a debt or used as a fund; -- so called in distinction from interest or profit.
(n.) The construction which gives shape and strength to a roof, -- generally a truss of timber or iron, but there are roofs with stone principals. Also, loosely, the most important member of a piece of framing.
(n.) In English organs the chief open metallic stop, an octave above the open diapason. On the manual it is four feet long, on the pedal eight feet. In Germany this term corresponds to the English open diapason.
(n.) A heirloom; a mortuary.
(n.) The first two long feathers of a hawk's wing.
(n.) One of turrets or pinnacles of waxwork and tapers with which the posts and center of a funeral hearse were formerly crowned.
(n.) A principal or essential point or rule; a principle.
Example Sentences:
(1) In addition to their involvement in thrombosis, activated platelets release growth factors, most notably a platelet-derived growth factor (PDGF) which may be the principal mediator of smooth muscle cell migration from the media into the intima and of smooth muscle cell proliferation in the intima as well as of vasoconstriction.
(2) While stereology is the principal technique, particularly in its application to the parenchyma, other compartments such as the airways and vasculature demand modifications or different methods altogether.
(3) Chromatography and immunoassays are the two principal techniques used in research and clinical laboratories for the measurement of drug concentrations in biological fluids.
(4) This paper reports, principally, the caries results of the first three surveys of 5, 12 and 5-year-olds undertaken at the end of 1987, 1988 and 1989, respectively.
(5) Rigidly fixing the pubic symphysis stiffened the model and resulted in principal stress patterns that did not reflect trabecular density or orientations as well as those of the deformable pubic symphysis model.
(6) The binding parameters indicate that the principal activating effect of UMP is not simply to increase the affinity of the enzyme for glucose.
(7) Mononuclear phagocytic cells from patients with either principal form of leprosy functioned similarly to normal monocytes in phagocytosis while their fungicidal activity for C. pseudotropicalis was statistically significantly altered and was more evident in the lepromatous than in the tuberculoid type.
(8) In the terminal segment of the hamster epididymidis there was some evidence of micro-merocrine protein secretion a the level of the principal cells and clear evidence of granular secretion in the light cells, presumable of glycoproteins.
(9) In the analysis of background fluorescence, the principal components were, as for the two-step technique, autofluorescence and propidium spectral overlap.
(10) However, at Period B, neutrophil numbers in the BAL fluid were increased in the principal but not in the control animals.
(11) Principal conclusions are: 1) rapid change to predominantly heterosexual HIV transmission can occur in North America, with serious societal impact; 2) gender-specific clinical features can lead to earlier diagnosis of HIV infection in women; 3) HIV infection in women does not pursue an inherently more rapid course than that observed in men.
(12) The concentrations of the principal extratesticular androgens and estradiol do not seem to have a quantitative influence on these androphilic proteins either.
(13) A principal function of GPIb is its attachment to von Willebrand Factor (vWF) on injured blood vessels which leads to the adhesion of platelets to these vessels.
(14) The principal variables influencing a particular configuration and their effects are indicated.
(15) The principal form of HMTs produced by these human peripheral blood monocytes has been subjected to biochemical, functional, and serological characterization.
(16) Micronutrient antioxidants such as alpha-tocopherol, the principal lipid-soluble antioxidant, assume potential significance because levels can be manipulated by dietary measures without resulting in side effects.
(17) Cytochrome oxidase histochemistry revealed patchy patterns of the enzyme activity in transverse sections through the caudal part of the ventral subnucleus of the principal sensory trigeminal nucleus, interpolar spinal trigeminal nucleus, and layer IV of the caudal spinal trigeminal nucleus in the cat.
(18) 3. an up-to-date review of the principal methods and systems used to measure the sedimentation rate--Automation of the Westergren initial methodology.
(19) • Queen Margaret Union, one of the University of Glasgow's two student unions, says 200 students there are marching on the principal's office at the moment to present an anti-cuts petition.
(20) This observation provides corroboration for the identification of the principal CCK-I neuron in the rat olfactory bulb as the centrally projecting middle tufted cell.
Taper
Definition:
(n.) A small wax candle; a small lighted wax candle; hence, a small light.
(n.) A tapering form; gradual diminution of thickness in an elongated object; as, the taper of a spire.
(a.) Regularly narrowed toward the point; becoming small toward one end; conical; pyramidical; as, taper fingers.
(v. i.) To become gradually smaller toward one end; as, a sugar loaf tapers toward one end.
(v. t.) To make or cause to taper.
Example Sentences:
(1) Axons emerge from proximal dendrites within 50 microns of the soma, and more rarely from the soma, in a tapering initial segment, commonly interrupted by one or two large swellings.
(2) The cases of S-type were changed to those of ST-type, which emphasized the Tapering type factors.
(3) The former possess a variety of spines, axonlike processes and sometimes an unmyelinated axon, and are presumably interneurons, while type IIB cells show a thick tapering axon that is probably myelinated.
(4) He presents measures for the management of withdrawal symptoms and relapse, focusing on the use of a slow taper over 3 to 6 months.
(5) In the experiments which covered exposure time from 4.5 to 17.0 s, we found that it started slowly, the reflectance increased rapidly once the surface temperature of the lesion reached approximately 90 degrees C. After this rapid rise, the reflectance began to taper off until no change in reflectance was recorded.
(6) During the 3-month tapering-off period eight initially improved patients (36%) in the cyclosporin group worsened, as did six (55%) in the placebo group.
(7) Special complications included postoperative renal deterioration, especially after tapering of megaureters.
(8) Yes, at the 2010 Conservative conference the party announced a similar cliff-edge at the higher rate tax threshold as a way of effectively means-testing child benefit payments, but that was eventually removed and replaced with a less egregious taper at the 2012 budget.
(9) Myocardial fibers were elongated and thinner (tapered) in the tips of papillary muscles.
(10) Urinary leakage in 3 patients with a right colonic reservoir (2 with an intussuscepted ileal nipple valve and 1 with a plicated ileal segment as a continence mechanism) was managed with tapered narrowing of the nipple valve and the ileocecal valve, respectively, using stapling techniques.
(11) Bad pun aside, investors are concerned that the company's high growth-rates are tapering.
(12) In addition, after incubation in ATP, they are intermingled with, and converge onto the surfaces of, thick, tapered filaments, which we have tentatively identified as of myosin-like nature.
(13) The spheroids grew exponentially with a volume-doubling time of approximately 24 h up to a diameter of approximately 580 microns and then the growth rate tapered off, more for spheroids grown at the low than at the high oxygen tension.
(14) The tapered tubes and constricted tubes are of special importance.
(15) It involves the deep white matter symmetrically, tapering off toward the cortex.
(16) Those on antihypertensive medication prior to enrollment without documented diastolic hypertension had their medication tapered and discontinued, and then met BP criteria (33% of cohort).
(17) It has not yet been possible to enumerate these tapered rods by culture methods, but as judged by visual appearances in the histological sections, they seemed to outnumber all other bacteria in the cecum and the colon by a factor of as much as 1000.
(18) Child benefit is to be withdrawn from families as soon as one parent hits earnings of £44,000, but any tapering would be costly and require ploughing money back via child tax credits.
(19) The imaging system consists of a ZnS(Ag) screen, two tapered fibers, an image intensifier, and a Polaroid film.
(20) The micropyle canal measures 8 microns at the opening and tapers to 3.6 microns as it penetrates the membrane.