|mīkəlsən|mȯrlē- noun
Usage: usually capitalized both Ms
Etymology: after Albert A. Michelson died 1931 American physicist and Edward W. Morley died 1923 American chemist and physicist
: an experiment that shows that the two parts of a divided ray of light travel at the same speed over paths perpendicular to each other (as over east-west and north-south paths) and that leads to the deductions that the motion of the earth through space has no effect upon the velocity of light and the absolute motion of the earth is not measurable