Kelvin
name, noun ·Uncommon ·Advanced level
Definitions
- 1 In the International System of Units, the base unit of thermodynamic temperature; ¹⁄_(273.16) of the thermodynamic temperature of the triple point of water.
"Ice melts above 273.15 kelvins."
- 2 Alternative letter-case form of kelvin. alt-of
- 3 the basic unit of thermodynamic temperature adopted under the Systeme International d'Unites wordnet
- 4 One degree of difference on this scale, as a unit interval.
"The dew point here today is only 1 kelvin above what it was yesterday."
- 5 A measurement of color warmth defined by the temperature kelvin at which an incandescent blackbody would emit a given color.
- 1 A river which flows through East Dunbartonshire council area and Glasgow council area, Scotland, to the River Clyde.
- 2 A locality in the Griffith council area, central New South Wales, Australia.
- 3 A surname from Scottish Gaelic.
- 4 A male given name transferred from the surname, of rather rare usage.
Example
More examples"Kelvin–Helmholtz waves are found across the universe wherever two materials of different density move past one another. They can be seen in cloud formations around Earth and have even been observed in other planetary atmospheres in our solar system."
Etymology
Named after Irish-born Scottish physicist William Thomson, Lord Kelvin.
Of Celtic/Scottish Gaelic origin, possibly from caol (“narrow”) or coille (“wooded”) + abhainn (“river”). The surname is derived from the river. The surname was also possibly influenced by Calvert (Middle English calfhirde).
Related phrases
More for "kelvin"
Data sourced from Wiktionary, WordNet, CMU, and other open linguistic databases. Updated March 2026.