| saturation | 1. The act of saturating, or the state of being saturating; complete penetration or impregnation. 2. <chemistry> The act, process, or result of saturating a substance, or of combining it to its fullest extent. 3. <optics> Freedom from mixture or dilution with white; purity; said of colours. The degree of saturation of a colour is its relative purity, or freedom from admixture with white. Origin: L. Saturatio: cf. F. Saturation. Source: Websters Dictionary (01 Mar 1998) |
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| saturation analysis | General term for an assay in which a binder competes for labelled versus unlabelled ligand; following separation of free and bound ligand, the ligand (the analyte assayed) is quantitated by relating bound and unbound ratios to known standards. See: enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay, radioreceptor assay, immunoassay, enzyme-multiplied immunoassay technique, radioimmunoassay. Synonym: displacement analysis, saturation analysis. (05 Mar 2000) |
| saturation index | An indication of the relative concentration of haemoglobin in the red blood cells, calculated as: grams of haemoglobin per 100 ml (expressed as percent of normal) ÷ haematocrit value (expressed as percent of normal) = saturation index The normal index for adults and infants is 0.97 to 1.02; in primary and secondary anaemia, the index is usually considerably less than 0.97. (05 Mar 2000) |
| saturation of receptors | Saturation, the state in which all receptors are effectively occupied all the time, can be said to occur in a simple binding equilibrium when the concentration of ligand is more than 5 times the Kd value, although strictly this will only be true at infinite ligand concentration. (18 Nov 1997) |
| secondary saturation | A technique of nitrous oxide anaesthesia consisting of an abrupt curtailment of the oxygen in the inhaled mixture to produce a deep plane of anaesthesia, following which oxygen is administered to correct hypoxia. (05 Mar 2000) |
| attention deficit disorder | An inability to control behaviour due to difficulty in processing neural stimuli. (12 Dec 1998) |
| attention deficit disorder with hyperactivity | A behaviour disorder originating in childhood in which the essential features are signs of developmentally inappropriate inattention, impulsivity, and hyperactivity. Although most individuals have symptoms of both inattention and hyperactivity-impulsivity, one or the other pattern may be predominant. The disorder is more frequent in males than females. Onset is in childhood. Symptoms often attenuate during late adolescence although a minority experience the full complement of symptoms into mid-adulthood. (12 Dec 1998) |
| attention deficit hyperactivity disorder | <psychiatry> A condition seen in children where there is increased motor activity in association with poor attention span. Often treated with amphetamine medications. (27 Sep 1997) |
| base deficit | A decrease in the total concentration of blood buffer base, indicative of metabolic acidosis or compensated respiratory alkalosis. (05 Mar 2000) |
| pulse deficit | The absence of palpable pulse waves in a peripheral artery for one or more heart beats, as is often seen in atrial fibrillation, the number of such missing pulse waves (usually expressed as heart rate minus pulse rate per minute). (05 Mar 2000) |
| deficit | A lack or deficiency. (18 Nov 1997) |
| oxygen deficit | The difference between oxygen uptake of the body during early stages of exercise and during a similar duration in a steady state of exercise; sometimes considered as the formation of the oxygen debt. (05 Mar 2000) |