BharatNotes Capacitor
nounUsage in a UPSC answer
Just as a capacitor silently accumulates charge before discharging it in a sudden surge, decades of unaddressed agrarian distress can act as a social capacitor, storing latent grievances that erupt into mass agitation the moment a triggering policy is announced.
Synonyms
Antonyms
Word Family
capacitor (n), capacitors (n pl), capacitance (n), capacitive (adj), capacitor-based (adj compound)
Root
English capacity (from Latin capacitas = holding power) + agentive -or; term standardised in 1926 British Engineering Glossary
Etymology
From capacity + -or; the term replaced the older word condenser (coined by Alessandro Volta in 1782) following a recommendation in the 1926 British Standard Glossary of Terms in Electrical Engineering.
Memory Hook
"CAPACITY to store": a capacitor has the CAPACITY to hold electric charge, just as capere (Latin "to hold") is the root of capacity.
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