boyle's law

Boyle's law   (boilz)    n.  The principle that at a constant temperature the volume of a confined ideal gas varies inversely with its pressure. [After Robert Boyle.]

Main Entry: Boyle's law
Pronunciation: "boi(&)lz-
Function: noun
: a statement in physics: the volume of a gas at constant temperature varies inverselywith the pressure exerted on it
Boyle,# /'boi(&)l,/ Robert (1627–1691), British physicist. Considered one of the fathers of modern chemistry, Boyle isknown especially for his pioneering experiments on the properties of gases. In 1662 he published his findings stating the relation concerning the compression and expansion of a gas at constanttemperature (Boyle's law). Boyle also wrote the first English treatise on electricity and espoused the theory that matter is corpuscular in composition. This theory was an important forerunner ofmodern chemical theory.

Boyle's law (boilz)
n.
The principle that at a constant temperature the volume of a confined ideal gas varies inversely with its pressure.

Boyle's law   (boilz)  Pronunciation Key  The principle that the volume of a given mass of an ideal gas is inversely proportional to its pressure, as long as temperature remains constant. Boyle's law is a subcase of the ideal gas law. Compare Charles's law.

Boyle's law

a relation concerning the compression and expansion of a gas at constant temperature. This empirical relation, formulated by the physicist Robert Boyle in 1662, states that the pressure (p) of a given quantity of gas varies inversely as its volume (v) at constant temperature; i.e., in equation form, pv = k, a constant. The relationship was also discovered by the French physicist Edme Mariotte (1676).

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