User Contributed Dictionary
Noun
- One skilled in the theory or construction of machines.
- To build such a device will require an expert mechanician.
- a1891, Constance Garnett (translator), Leo Tolstoy (author),
Anna Karenin, in The Harvard Classics Shelf of Fiction, P.F.
Collier & son (1917), page 214,
- "The mechanician came when I was away; I haven't seen him yet," he said, not looking at her.
- The Yankees, the first mechanicians in the world, are engineers-- just as the Italians are musicians and the Germans metaphysicians-- by right of birth. -- from From The Earth To The Moon by Jules Verne.
- The Cotton-Gin is a machine to separate the seeds from cotton, invented by that celebrated mechanician, E. Whitney. -- from the 1828 Webster's Dictionary.
- One skilled in building, using, or repairing machines, or who
makes machines or tools.
- Shortly after being removed to the hospital Wright recovered consciousness and sent for Taylor, his mechanician. -- "Fatal fall of Wright airship", New York Times September 18th 1908
- One skilled in mechanics.
- A machinist.
- A scientifically trained practitioner.
- A mechanic.
See also
References
- Free Dictionary
- Encarta World English dictionary
- Merriam-Webster Online Dictionary
- Random House Unabridged Dictionary (via infoplease)
- Webster's Revised Unabriged Dictorary
- (via onelook)
- Webster's 1828 Dictionar (via [http://65.66.134.201/cgi-bin/webster/webster.exe?search_for_texts_web1828=mechanician this site])
- Wordsmyth
Extensive Definition
A Mechanician is an engineer or a scientist
working in the field of mechanics, or in a related or
sub-field: engineering or computational
mechanics, applied
mechanics, geomechanics, biomechanics, and mechanics
of materials. Names other than mechanician have been used
occasionally, such as mechaniker and mechanicist.
People who made lasting contributions to mechanics more than 100 years ago
- Abū Sahl al-Qūhī: variation of weight and distance from centre of mass
- Alhazen: attraction between masses, acceleration due to gravity, law of inertia, first law of motion
- Al-Jazari: crank, reciprocating motion, double-acting principle
- Al-Khazini: variation of gravity and distance from centre of mass, distinction between force, mass and weight
- Guillaume Amontons: laws of friction
- Augustin Louis Cauchy: elasticity
- Leonhard Euler: buckling, rigid body dynamics
- Galileo Galilei: notion of strength
- Josiah Willard Gibbs: thermodynamics
- William Rowan Hamilton: Hamiltonian mechanics
- Heinrich Rudolf Hertz: contact mechanics
- Robert Hooke: Hooke's law
- Gustav Kirchhoff: theory of plates
- Joseph Louis Lagrange: Lagrangian mechanics
- Pierre-Simon Laplace: effects of surface tension
- Claude-Louis Navier: elasticity, fluid mechanics
- Sophie Germain: elasticity
- Issac Newton: Newton's laws, law of gravitation
- Siméon Denis Poisson: elasticity
- Saint-Venant: elasticity
- George Gabriel Stokes: fluid mechanics
People who made lasting contributions to mechanics and died in recent 100 years
- Stephen Timoshenko: author of many lasting textbooks, father of modern applied mechanics
- John D. Eshelby: inclusion in elastic body
- Alan Arnold Griffith: founder of Fracture mechanics
- George Rankine Irwin: father of modern Fracture mechanics
- Theodore von Karman: Fluid mechanics, Structural instability
- Warner T. Koiter: Solid mechanics, Structural instability
- Richard Edler von Mises: Plasticity
- Ludwig Prandtl: Fluid mechanics, Plasticity
- Geoffrey Ingram Taylor: Fluid mechanics, theory of dislocations.
by
American Society of Civil Engineers
- Theodore von Karman Medal, ASCE
by
Society of Engineering Science, Inc.
- William Prager Medal in Solid Mechanics
- G. I. Taylor Medal in Fluid Mechanics
See also
External links
- iMechanica, news and views of interest to mechanicians and their friends.
- Homepage of the ASME International Applied Mechanics Division
- Mathematics Geneaology Project
- Mechanician Career Description
- The MacTutor History of Mathematics archive