orbital

Etymology

Borrowed from Medieval Latin orbitālis, from orbita (“a track or rut; a circuit, orbit”) + -ālis (“-al”, adjectival suffix), equivalent to orbit + -al. Doublet of orbitalis.

adj

1. Of or relating to, or forming an orbit (such as the orbit of a moon, planet, or spacecraft).
2. (anatomy) Of or relating to the eye socket (eyehole).
3. (chiefly UK) (of roads, railways) Passing around the outside of an urban area.
   The M25 is an orbital motorway around London.
   The rail orbital routes outside of the M25 and South Coast are challenging. The corridors aren't particularly reliable, and in some places they don't exist. … But the reliability and journey times, particularly on the orbital routes: one train an hour from Gatwick Airport to Reading? Surely we can do better than that? October 23 2019, Rail, pages 22, 23

noun

1. (chiefly UK) Ellipsis of orbital motorway..
2. (physics) A specification of the energy and probability density of one or more electrons at any point in an atom or molecule, and can be represented as a wave function.
3. Short for orbital sander.
   As with most power tools, orbitals can be divided into light and heavy-duty categories. 1967, Popular Mechanics, volume 128, number 6, page 166