self-shieldingn.
/ˌsɛlfˈʃiːldɪŋ/, U.S. /ˌsɛlfˈʃildɪŋ/ 1. The action or fact of protecting or shielding oneself, esp. from something immaterial.
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the world > action or operation > safety > protection or defence > [noun] > defending oneself
self-defence1609
self-shielding1874
1874 E. P. Roe Opening Chestnut Burr xxxiv. 537 Then strongly arose the womanly instinct of self-shielding and the purpose to hide her secret.
1909 W. DeW. Hyde Sin & its Forgiveness iii. 46 It sprang from nothing worse than this childish impulse to shield one's self; and..only gradually had this impulse of self-shielding grown into its odious and hideous counterpart.
1966 D. L. Russell in J. M. Brown et al. Appl. Psychol. ii. 64 This self-shielding gives him time to think things through rationally and to manage his difficulties in more appropriate ways.
1993 Texas Stud. Lit. & Lang. 35 48 The wit she deploys here..is actually a protective strategy, produced in her encounters with men and designed for self-shielding.
2. With reference to an electrical cable, an electrical or magnetic instrument, etc.: shielding provided by its own design or configuration against external electric or magnetic fields, or to enclose or contain its own electric or magnetic field.
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1935 Edison Electric Inst. Bull. Jan. 27 (title) Experimental investigation of self-shielding of telephone cables.
1941 Trans. Amer. Inst. Electr. Engineers 60 436 Due to the high electrical resistance of this material.., it has very little self-shielding under surge conditions.
1977 W. Y. Chen et al. in Proc. 7th Symp. Engin. Probl. Fusion Res. II. 1301/1 Particular emphasis has been made on the effect of the transport current and conductor self-shielding in the external time varying field.
2004 Hi-Fi News & Rec. Rev. Feb. 41/1 Their [sc. the speaker cables'] interleaved construction means that..there is a good degree of self-shielding.
3. The complete or partial absorption of radiation by the body or substance emitting it (cf. self-absorption n. 2). Also: the prevention or attenuation of radiation reaching the interior of a body or substance exposed to radiation as a result of absorption by its outer parts.Recorded earliest in attributive use.
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1948 J. L. Balderston et al. Nomograms for Calculation Gamma Shielding (U.S. Atomic Energy Comm.) 6 z = effective self-shielding thickness.
1954 Analytica Chimica Acta 10 121 Neutron self-shielding. In cases where the neutron absorption cross-section σ of an irradiated element is high there is the possibility of a self-shielding effect.
1963 B. Fozard Instrumentation Nucl. Reactors i. 3 In many practical cases difficulties [in measuring the radioactivity of a source] arise due to such phenomena as self-shielding.
1977 J. Moteff in J. Weisman Elem. Nucl. Reactor Design v. 143 The receptor is shielded from each point source not only by interposed shielding material but also by materials within the source itself. This second contribution to the total shielding is called self-shielding or self-absorption.
2002 Nature 21 Feb. 860/2 Photochemical self-shielding of carbon monoxide, a process that is known to occur in molecular clouds, may also have been important in the solar nebula.
This entry has been updated (OED Third Edition, January 2018; most recently modified version published online March 2022).
self-shieldingadj.
/ˌsɛlfˈʃiːldɪŋ/, U.S. /ˌsɛlfˈʃildɪŋ/ 1. Of action: that serves to shield or protect the person who undertakes it.
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1869 A. Edwards Susan Fielding xv, in Temple Bar Apr. 1 The first instinctive self-shielding outcry of his own stricken conscience.
1896 Black Cat Jan. 32 I would overcome my cowardly self-shielding reticence, tell my story as an eye-witness of the murder..and submit my photographs as evidence.
1926 Ann. Amer. Acad. Polit. & Social Sci. 125 163/1 Can our present American statistics of addition have been affected by our self-shielding international diplomacy?
2012 Daily Variety (Nexis) 3 Dec. 1 As accessible as Pete and Debbie are as characters, they also benefit from Apatow's distinct verbal acumen, swearing like sailors, often reverting to self-shielding sarcasm.
2. Physics. That protects or shields itself by means of its configuration, outer layers, etc., against external fields or radiation. Also: that itself contains or shields the fields or radiation it produces.
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1908 Railway World 31 July 664/1 Owing to the peculiar self-shielding form of the permanent magnets, an iron case is not necessary for shielding against the effects of external fields.
1922 Chem. News 26 May 293/2 The tube is self shielding—only a narrow pencil of X-rays escaping from an aluminium window.
1977 Amer. Scientist July 452/3 Once the H2 becomes self-shielding, there may be very much more H2 in a cloud.
2006 A. Williams & F. Taylor Electronic Filter Design Handbk. (ed. 4) ix. 376 The structure is self-shielding because stray magnetic fields are prevented from entering or leaving the structure.
This entry has been updated (OED Third Edition, January 2018; most recently modified version published online March 2022).
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n.1874
adj.1869