Word.ws English Dictionary

virial

virial adjective: of or pertaining to the interactive forces between molecules or particles. Also the misspelling of viral.

Adjective

virial (not comparable)

  1. Of or pertaining to the interactive forces between molecules or particles.

Noun

virial (plural virials)

  1. One-half of the product of the stress of attraction or repulsion with the distance between two particles.
    • The quantity 1/2 Rr, or half the product of the attraction into the distance across which the attraction is exerted, is defined by Clausis [Prof. Clausis of Bonn] as the virial of the attraction. (In the case of pressure or repulsion, the virial is negative.)1875, James Clerk Maxwell, “On the Dynamical Evidence of the Molecular Constitution of Bodies”, in Nature, 11 (1875), 357-359, 374-377

Also used as

virial is also the misspelling of viral.

Forms of virial

pluralvirials

Origin of virial

From Latin vīs (vīs has a hidden "r" that shows in forms such as the genitive plural, vīrium).

Words formed from virial

Phrases with virial

Questions about virial

What does virial mean?
Virial means of or pertaining to the interactive forces between molecules or particles.
What part of speech is virial?
Virial can be an adjective or a noun.

Words near virial in the dictionary

  1. virgules
  2. virguncule
  3. virguncules
  4. viri
  5. viri-
  6. virial
  7. virial coefficient
  8. virial coefficients
  9. virial theorem
  10. virialisation
  11. virialise

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: virial (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

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