centrifuge

Etymology

It is borrowed from French centrifuge, the French adjective meaning centrifugal, also used as a noun for a centrifugal machine,^{[2][3][4][5][6]} from New Latin centrifugus (“fleeing the centre”),^[3][4][7][5] formed from Latin centrum (“centre”) and fugiō (“to flee”).^[6][2] The OED dates the French adjective to 1700 and its noun use to 1856 or earlier, and compares German Centrifuge, now usually Zentrifuge.^[2] Etymonline says that Isaac Newton coined the Latin adjective in his “Principia” (1687),^[6] but the OED finds it first in a letter from Christiaan Huygens to Henry Oldenburg of 4 September 1669, and then in Huygens's “Horologium oscillatorium” (1673), to which Newton referred.^[2] The same Latin adjective gave centrifugal.^[6][2][7] The verb is partly from the French adjective or its Latin source, and partly a conversion of the English noun.^[2]

Earliest recorded meaning

To move away from a central point: 1705, in C. Purshall's Essay at the Mechanism of the Macrocosm, a rare verb that did not survive.^[2] The adjective, meaning centrifugal, is recorded from 1719 to 1801.^[2][8]

Semantic evolution

The modern noun, a machine that spins a substance rapidly about a fixed axis, especially to separate the parts of a mixture, is first recorded in 1866 in the English Mechanic.^[2] Etymonline and Merriam-Webster Unabridged date it to 1887,^[6][4] and Etymonline adds that it was first a machine for separating cream from milk, the special sense in the 1989 edition of the OED.^[6][8] Coleridge used the noun in 1823 for centrifugal action itself, a rare use that did not last.^[2] The transitive verb, to spin something in a centrifuge or separate it by one, followed in 1883;^[2] Merriam-Webster Unabridged dates it to about 1895 and the 1989 edition of the OED to 1902.^[4][8] From 1944 the word was also used of an apparatus that whirls people or animals round to simulate the forces felt during a launch.^[2][9]

Timeline

• 1705 – verb, to move away from a centre (now obsolete).^[2]
• 1719 – adjective, centrifugal (obsolete after 1801).^[2]
• 1823 – noun, centrifugal action (rare, obsolete).^[2]
• 1866 – a machine that spins a substance rapidly, especially to separate a mixture.^[2] Etymonline and Merriam-Webster Unabridged date this sense to 1887.^[6][4]
• 1883 – verb, to treat or separate in a centrifuge.^[2]
• 1944 – an apparatus for whirling people or animals to simulate the forces of a launch.^[2]

Meanings

Noun

1. A machine that spins at high speed to separate substances of different densities by centrifugal force.^[4][9][2]
2. A rotating apparatus in which people or animals are subjected to strong accelerations, producing artificial gravity for training or experiments.^[4][9][2]

Verb

1. To spin something in a centrifuge, or to separate it by means of one: The technician centrifuged the samples before testing them.^[4][9][2]

Word family

• centrifugation
• centrifugate
• recentrifuge
• ultracentrifuge

Related words

• centrifugal force
• centripetal
• center
• fugitive
• refuge
• subterfuge

References

1. ^ Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q r s t u Oxford English Dictionary Online (accessed March 2026), Oxford: Oxford University Press
3. ^ a b The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (online 2024), 5th ed., Boston: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
4. ^ a b c d e f g h Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
5. ^ a b Dictionary.com Unabridged (2016), based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, New York: Random House
6. ^ a b c d e f g Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
7. ^ a b Klein, Ernest. A Comprehensive Etymological Dictionary of the English Language. 2 vols. Amsterdam: Elsevier, 1966–1967.
8. ^ a b c Simpson, J. A.; Weiner, E. S. C., eds. (1989), The Oxford English Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Clarendon Press
9. ^ a b c d Collins English Dictionary (2023), Glasgow: HarperCollins