terminator

Etymology

* Partly from post-classical Latin terminator (5th century), from Latin terminō; partly from terminate + -or. * (android that kills humans): After the 1984 film The Terminator.

noun

1. Someone who terminates or ends something, especially (in later use) an assassin or exterminator.
2. (computing) A text character that serves to mark the end of a document or transmission.
3. (astronomy) The line between the day side and the night side of a moon, planet or other celestial body.
   Harriot, looking at the moon, saw the irregular terminator, the highlights and shadows, the mountain ranges and valleys that Galileo had described – and he also convinced himself that he saw Galileo's imaginary crater. 2015, David Wootton, The Invention of Science, Penguin, published 2016, page 218
4. (biochemistry) A DNA sequence which causes RNA transcription to cease and an mRNA transcript to break off.
5. (electronics) An electrical device that absorbs reflection at the end of a transmission line.
6. (science fiction) An intelligent android created to destroy humans.