magnetic compass

An instrument that uses a magnetized steel bar to indicate direction relative to the earth's magnetic poles.

American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fifth Edition. Copyright © 2016 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. All rights reserved.

magnetic compass

(General Physics) a compass containing a magnetic needle pivoted in a horizontal plane, that indicates the direction of magnetic north at points on the earth's surface

Collins English Dictionary – Complete and Unabridged, 12th Edition 2014 © HarperCollins Publishers 1991, 1994, 1998, 2000, 2003, 2006, 2007, 2009, 2011, 2014

magnetic compass

An instrument containing a freely suspended magnetic element which displays the direction of the horizontal component of the Earth's magnetic field at the point of observation.

Dictionary of Military and Associated Terms. US Department of Defense 2005.

ThesaurusAntonymsRelated WordsSynonymsLegend:

Noun

magnetic compass - compass based on an indicator (as a magnetic needle) that points to the magnetic north

compass - navigational instrument for finding directions

compass card, mariner's compass - compass in the form of a card that rotates so that 0 degrees or North points to magnetic north

magnetic needle - a slender magnet suspended in a magnetic compass on a mounting with little friction; used to indicate the direction of the earth's magnetic pole

Translations

方位磁針

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But as any instrument student learns early in ground school, the average magnetic compass incorporates a dizzying array of shortcomings.

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A magnetic compass can tell you which way is north, but there is no evidence that people from ancient Scandinavia used them.

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The basic sight includes an eye display, a daylight TV channel, a laser rangefinder, a magnetic compass and a tilt indicator.

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A cell in the eye may be worth two in the beak, at least when it comes to a migratory bird's magnetic compass. In European robins, a visual center in the brain and light-sensing cells in the eye--not magnetic sensing cells in the beak--allow the songbirds to detect which direction is north and migrate correctly, scientists report in the Oct.

In European robins, eyes beat out beaks for sensing magnetic fields: migratory compass relies on light-processing brain area

When the outboard seats are on the cabin floor, the aluminum seat tubes rest on wires that run to the AN/ASN43 gyro magnetic compass, the communication coaxials, and the AN/APR-39 radar signal detecting set.

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And researchers aligned with a competing model say they are not convinced.But by identifying for the first time a molecule that reacts to very weak magnetic fields, the experiments prove the plausibility of a long-hypothesized method of avian navigation that has had a credibility problem because no one had ever found a molecule with the required sensitivity."This is a proof of principle that a chemical reaction can act as a magnetic compass," said Peter Hore of the University of Oxford, who with fellow chemist Christiane Timmel led the research.Hore is testing similar molecules, called cryptochromes, isolated from the eyes of migratory birds.

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While flying back to Detroit, from the Masters, in Augusta, Ga, I had an interesting magnetic compass experience.

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Sybil Jones, 77, contacted the Echo after we wrote about the binnacle, a magnetic compass from Captain Scott's ship the Terra Nova, being the last remaining artefact from the ship.

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Furthermore, if one disturbs one magnetic compass in the ordered domain by moving a small magnet closer by hand, propagation of the local directional disturbance to the whole of the ordered domain can be observed.

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Einstein got his introduction to science when his dad bought him a magnetic compass.

CRITIC'S CHOICE; Science, relatively speaking