All articles starting with M

Monosemanticity

Monosemanticity is a property of a neural network unit, such as a single neuron, that consistently and exclusively encodes one interpretable concept, studied with sparse autoencoders.

Monosodium glutamate (MSG), the sodium salt of glutamic acid, is the major umami flavor enhancer discovered by Kikunae Ikeda in 1908 and commercialized as AJI-NO-MOTO in 1909, now made by fermentation at about 2 million tons per year.

Monosodium phosphate

Monosodium phosphate (NaH₂PO₄), also called sodium dihydrogen phosphate or sodium phosphate monobasic, is a white crystalline sodium salt of phosphoric acid used in animal feed, water treatment, and food processing.

Monosomy 13q14 syndrome

Monosomy 13q14 syndrome (Del(13)(q14), ORPHA:1587) is a rare chromosomal deletion syndrome of chromosome band 13q14 causing retinoblastoma, developmental delay, variable intellectual disability, and characteristic craniofacial dysmorphism.

Monosomy 18p syndrome

Monosomy 18p syndrome (18p-, De Grouchy syndrome type I) is a rare deletion of chromosome 18's short arm, incidence about 1:50,000, causing developmental delay, short stature, and dysmorphic facial features.

Monosomy 18q syndrome

Monosomy 18q syndrome, or De Grouchy syndrome type 2, is a rare chromosomal disorder caused by a deletion on chromosome 18, causing developmental delay and hypotonia.

Monosomy 22 syndrome

Monosomy 22 syndrome (Del(22), ORPHA:96123) is a rare autosomal anomaly from partial or complete loss of chromosome 22, with short stature, joint abnormalities, cardiac defects, craniofacial dysmorphism, and intellectual disability; distinct from 22q11.2 deletion syndrome.

Monosomy 9p syndrome

Monosomy 9p syndrome (9p deletion syndrome, Alfi syndrome, OMIM 158170): rare chromosomal disorder from deletion of chromosome 9p, causing developmental delay, trigonocephaly, hypotonia, and XY genital defects via DMRT1 loss.

Monospaced font

A monospaced font is a typeface in which every character takes the same fixed horizontal width, the defining feature of typewriter faces and the fonts used to display computer code.

Sep 19, 2026

MonotaRO

MonotaRO is a Japanese e-commerce company selling maintenance, repair, and operating supplies to businesses online, founded in Osaka in 2000 and majority-owned by W.W. Grainger since 2009.

Monotectic

A monotectic reaction is an invariant phase transition in which, on cooling, one liquid phase transforms into a second liquid and a solid, occurring in alloys with limited liquid solubility.

Monotheism

Monotheism is the belief that there is only one God, the defining doctrine of Judaism, Christianity, Islam, Sikhism, and Zoroastrianism, each articulating God's oneness in its own doctrinal terms.

Monotheism in pre-Islamic Arabia

Monotheism in pre-Islamic Arabia, or pre-Islamic Arabian monotheism, is the set of one-God religions in Arabia before Islam: Jewish Ḥimyar, Christian communities, and inscriptions invoking only Allāh.

Monotis

Monotis is an extinct Late Triassic pectinoid bivalve genus (family Monotidae), a thin-shelled flat clam and leading Norian index fossil; about 15 species died out at the Norian/Rhaetian boundary, leaving dwarfed Rhaetian survivors.

Monotone (software)

Monotone is a free distributed version control system created by Graydon Hoare in 2002–2003, notable for SHA-1 content identifiers and cryptographic trust checks, and an influence on Git and Mercurial.

Monotone class theorem

The monotone class theorem is a measure theory result stating that a monotone class containing an algebra also contains the σ-algebra it generates, attributed to Paul Halmos.

Monotone convergence theorem

The monotone convergence theorem, or Beppo Levi's theorem, is a result of Lebesgue integration proved in 1906 stating that the integral of the limit of increasing nonnegative functions equals the limit of their integrals.

Monotonic function

A monotonic function, also called a monotone function, is a real function that preserves or reverses order, so its outputs move in one fixed direction.

Monotonicity criterion

The monotonicity criterion in voting theory: raising a candidate on ballots must never make them lose. Plurality, Borda, approval pass; instant-runoff, Coombs', Dodgson's, and Nanson's rules fail; Burlington 2009 is the famous case.

Monotreme

Monotreme (Monotremata): egg-laying mammals of Australia and New Guinea, five living species (platypus plus four echidnas), no teats, milk from belly pores, platypus with 40,000 bill electroreceptors, oldest fossil Teinolophos 130 million years old.

Oct 20, 2026

Monotropa

Monotropa (ghost pipe, Indian pipe, pinesap) is a genus of four accepted achlorophyllous mycoheterotrophic herbs in Ericaceae, native from the subarctic and temperate Northern Hemisphere to Colombia, feeding via monotropoid mycorrhizas with Russulaceae or Tricholoma fungi and pollinated mainly by Bombus bumblebees.

Monotropa uniflora

Monotropa uniflora, ghost pipe or Indian pipe (shui jing lan), is a white chlorophyll-free Ericaceae herb parasitizing Russulaceae mycorrhizal fungi linked to trees, native from Canada to Mexico and East Asia, with a ~46 kb reduced plastome.

Oct 22, 2026

Monotype

A monotype is a unique print made by applying paint or ink to an unworked plate and transferring the image to paper, yielding one strong impression.

Monotype machine

The Monotype machine is a hot-metal typesetting system, patented by American engineer Tolbert Lanston in 1887, whose keyboard punches a paper tape a caster reads to cast individual types.

Monotypic archaeal genera

Monotypic archaeal genera are genera of archaea containing exactly one described species. Database counts disagree sharply, listing 129 to 2,769 archaeal genera depending on the authority.

Monotypic higher-rank archaeal taxa

Monotypic higher-rank archaeal taxa are archaeal families, orders, classes, or phyla with a single described member lineage, exemplified by Promethearchaeota, established in 2024 from the first cultured Asgard archaeon.

Monoubiquitination and atypical ubiquitin modification

Monoubiquitination is the attachment of a single ubiquitin protein to a substrate, a mostly non-degradative signal regulating endocytosis, DNA repair, histone function, and membrane trafficking.

Monounsaturated fat

Monounsaturated fat, often abbreviated MUFA, is dietary fat with exactly one double bond in its fatty acids, found mainly in olive oil, nuts, and avocados.

Monovalent oral poliomyelitis vaccine type 1

Monovalent oral poliomyelitis vaccine type 1 (mOPV1) is a live attenuated Sabin type 1 oral polio vaccine, licensed from 2005, giving about 81% per-dose seroconversion versus 30-40% for trivalent OPV and used in mass campaigns against type 1 polio.