| overnight capital cost | The capital cost of a project if it could be constructed overnight. This cost does not include the interest cost of funds used during construction. (05 Dec 1998) |
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| overpressure | Excessive pressure or urging. Source: Websters Dictionary (01 Mar 1998) |
| overproduction theory | The loss or destruction of a part or element in the organic world is likely to result in compensatory replacement and overproduction of tissue during the process of regeneration or repair (or both), as in the formation of callus when a fractured bone heals. Synonym: overproduction theory. (05 Mar 2000) |
| overresponse | An abnormally strong reaction to a stimulus. (05 Mar 2000) |
| overriding | 1. Slippage of the lower fragment of a broken long bone upward and alongside the proximal portion. 2. Obsolete term denoting a foetal head which is palpable above the symphysis because of cephalopelvic disproportion. (05 Mar 2000) |
| overriding aorta | A congenitally malpositioned aorta whose origin straddles the ventricular septum and so receives ejected blood from the right ventricle as well as from the left; it is found especially in tetralogy of Fallot. (05 Mar 2000) |
| overripe cataract | A cataract in which the lens cortex becomes liquid, with the nucleus gravitating within the capsule (Morgagni's cataract). Synonym: overripe cataract. (05 Mar 2000) |
| oversensing | Sensing of electrical or magnetic signals, which normally should not be sensed by a pacemaker, but result in inappropriate inhibition of the pacemaker's output. (05 Mar 2000) |
| overshoot | 1. Generally, any initial change, in response to a sudden step change in some factor, that is greater than the steady-state response to the new level of that factor; common in systems in which inertia or a time lag in negative feedback outweighs any damping that may be present. Changes in a negative direction are sometimes distinguished by the term undershoot, and the two may alternate in an oscillatory fashion, as in the transient oscillations of a pendulum when released from an initial displacement. 2. Momentary reversal of the membrane potential of a cell (inside becoming positive rather than negative relative to the outside) during an action potential; considered a form of overshoot because, before discovery of overshoot, excitation was thought merely to depolarise the membrane to zero transmembrane potential. (05 Mar 2000) |
| oversight | 1. Watchful care; superintendence; general supervision. 2. An overlooking; an omission; an error. 3. Escape from an overlooked peril. "His fool-happy oversight." Synonym: Superintendence, supervision, inspection, overlooking, inadvertence, neglect, mistake, error, omission. Source: Websters Dictionary (01 Mar 1998) |
| overstory | Overstory is the larger, taller trees of growth which occupies a forest area and shades young trees, hardwoods, brush, and other deciduous varieties which are growing beneath the larger trees (i.e., understory). (09 Oct 1997) |
| overt homosexuality | Homosexual inclinations consciously experienced and expressed in actual homosexual behaviour. (05 Mar 2000) |
| overthwart | Across; from alde to side of. "Huge trees overthwart one another." 1. Having a transverse position; placed or situated across; hence, opposite. "Our overthwart neighbors." 2. Crossing in kind or disposition; perverse; adverse; opposing. "Overthwart humor." Source: Websters Dictionary (01 Mar 1998) |
| Overton, Charles | <person> German biologist in Sweden, 1865-1933. See: Meyer-Overton rule, Meyer-Overton theory of narcosis. (05 Mar 2000) |
| overtone | Any of the tones, other than the lowest or fundamental tone, of which a sound is composed. (05 Mar 2000) |