flux

Etymology

From Old French flux, from Latin fluxus (“flow”).

noun

1. The act of flowing; a continuous moving on or passing by, as of a flowing stream.
   1991, Mann, H., Fyfe, W., Tazaki, K., & Kerrich, R., Biological Accumulation of Different Chemical Elements by Microorganisms from Yellowstone National Park, USA. Mechanisms And Phylogeny Of Mineralization In Biological Systems, 357-362. Investigation of the silica budget for the Upper and Lower Geyser Basins of Yellowstone National Park by Truesdell et al. suggest that the present fluxes of hotspring water and thermal energy may have been continuous for at least the past 10,000 yr.
2. A state of ongoing change.
   The schedule is in flux at the moment.
   Languages, like our bodies, are in a continual flux.
   Her image has escaped the flux of things, / And that same infant beauty that she wore / Is fixed upon her now forevermore. 1856, Richard Chenevix Trench, On the Death of an Infant
   Darwin recognized that just as the features of the inorganic world—deltas, river valleys, mountain chains—were brought into being by gradual change, the organic world similarly was subject to constant flux. 2014, Elizabeth Kolbert, The Sixth Extinction: An Unnatural History, Picador, pages 55–56
   […] her eldest son, now King Charles III, has assumed the monarch’s role[…]as the anchor of a nation’s identity in troubled times of change and flux. 2022-09-19, Alan Cowell, “From Coronation to Funeral: Bookends to the Life of a Queen, and a Generation”, in The New York Times, →ISSN
3. A chemical agent for cleaning metal prior to soldering or welding.
   It is important to use flux when soldering or oxides on the metal will prevent a good bond.
4. (physics) The rate of transfer of energy (or another physical quantity), especially an electric or magnetic field, through a given surface.
   That high a neutron flux would be lethal in seconds.
5. (archaic) A disease which causes diarrhea, especially dysentery.
6. (archaic) Diarrhea or other fluid discharge from the body.
7. The state of being liquid through heat; fusion.

verb

1. (transitive) To use flux on.
   You have to flux the joint before soldering.
2. (transitive) To melt.
3. (intransitive) To flow as a liquid.

adj

1. (uncommon) Flowing; unstable; inconstant; variable.
   The flux nature of all things here. a. 1677, Isaac Barrow, "On Contentment", Sermon XL, in The Theological Works, Volume 2, Clarendon Press, 1818, page 375