absorption

[In Fr. absorption; late Lat. absorptio = a drink or beverage; fr. absorbeo = to swallow up, to devour.] [ABSORB.] I. The act, operation, or proce of absorbing, sucking in, or swallowing anything, or otherwise causing it to disappear in another body. A. Lit .: 1. Gen.: The sucking in of a liquid by a sponge or other porous substance. Biol. Absorption by organised bodies is the taking up or imbibing, by means of their ti ues, of material suitable for their nourishment, that it may ultimately be transmitted by the vascular channels to more distant parts. [ABSORBENT, 8., I. & II.] 'Death puts a stop to all further absorption of nutritive matter."- Todd and Bowman: Phys. Anat. 2. Chem. The taking up of a gas by a liquid, or by a porous solid. [ABSORBENT, 8.] "The absorption by the lungs of atmospheric oxygen."-Martin eau: Comte's Philosophy , bk. iv. 3. Nat . Phil .: The taking up rays of light and heat by certain bodies through which they are pa ing. Absorption of Light : The retention of some rays and the reflection of others when they pa into an imperfectly transparent body. If all were absorbed, the body would be black; if none, it would be white; but when some rays are absorbed, and others reflected, the body is then of one of the bright and lively colours. ". as the result of the absorption of all the blue light, first came the rosy-fingered dawn, and then the red sun himself."-Times: Transit of Venus, April 20, 1875. Absorption of Heat : The retention and consequent disappearance of rays of heat in pa ing into or through a body colder than themselves. (See No. III.) 4. Old Geol.: The swallowing up of a solid by another body. Absorption of the Earth: A term used by Kircher and others for the subsidence of tracts B. Fig .: The act or proce of causing anything partly or wholly immaterial to disappear in a more or le analogous way. a constant proce of absorption and appro priation exercised on the dialects of Italy ar and Greece.' -Max Muller : Science of Lang ., vol. ii, p. 309. when the ordinary rule of the absorption of the weaker letter does not hold good."-Beames: Comp. Gram., Aryan Lang. of India , vol. L (See also example under No. II.) II. The state of being so absorbed, sucked in, swallowed up, or made to disappear. Used in all the senses of No. I. (q.v.) "When one of two adjoining tribes becomes more numerous and powerful than the other, the contest is soon settled by war, slaughter, cannibal isım, slavery, and absorption."-Darwin: Descent of Man , ch. vii. III. The thing so absorbed, or its amount. Heat: The power of absorption is equal to that of emi ion. Chem. The co-efficient of absorption of a gas is the volume of the gas reduced to 0° Cent. and 760 m.m. pre ure, which is absorbed by the unit of volume of any liquid. (Graham: Chem., vol. ii.)