Technology Glossary

Carcinogen

A substance or exposure capable of increasing the risk of cancer by damaging cells or altering biological processes.

Carrier-phase positioning measures the phase of a GNSS radio carrier rather than relying only on its coded ranging signal. Resolving the number of carrier cycles enables much finer distance measurements and underpins centimetre-level techniques such as RTK.

Catastrophic Forgetting

A failure mode in machine learning in which training a model on new information substantially degrades knowledge or skills learned earlier. It is especially common in sequential or continual learning when new updates overwrite parameters important to previous tasks.

Cavity Magnonics

A research field that studies interactions between collective magnetic excitations and microwave photons confined inside resonant cavities.

CCR5(CCR5)

A protein on the surface of certain immune cells that HIV uses as a co-receptor to enter and infect them. Blocking CCR5 can prevent the virus from entering new cells.

Cell-Free Protein Expression

A method that uses extracted molecular machinery, including ribosomes and enzymes, to manufacture proteins without maintaining living cells. It gives researchers direct control over reaction ingredients and is useful for rapid prototyping and biochemical screening.

Cellular Agriculture

The production of biological materials using cultured cells rather than raising or harvesting whole organisms.

Central Memory T Cell(TCM)

A long-lived T cell that circulates through lymphoid tissues and can multiply rapidly and produce effector cells when it encounters a familiar antigen again.

Channelrhodopsin

A microbial light-sensitive protein that can form an ion channel in a cell membrane and change cellular electrical activity when illuminated.

Chart Manipulation

An attempt to distort a music ranking through ineligible, artificial or coordinated sales and streams instead of genuine audience activity.

Cherenkov Radiation

Light emitted when a charged particle moves through a transparent material faster than light travels through that material. Detectors use its timing and pattern to reconstruct particle events.

Chirality

A property of an object or molecule whose mirror image cannot be placed exactly on top of it, like left and right hands. In materials and robotics, chirality can determine the direction of twisting or rotation.

Circularization Burn

An engine firing used to change an elliptical orbit into a more circular one. The burn usually raises the low point of the orbit, helping a spacecraft remain safely above the atmosphere or reach the path required for payload deployment.

Circularly Polarized Luminescence(CPL)

Light emission in which the electric field rotates preferentially clockwise or counterclockwise as the light travels. Because the direction and strength of the signal can depend on molecular chirality, CPL measurements can help characterize handed chemical and biological structures.

Circulating Tumor DNA(ctDNA)

Small fragments of DNA released by tumor cells into the bloodstream. Tests can use them to detect molecular signs of cancer, monitor treatment or estimate recurrence risk.

Circumgalactic Medium

Diffuse gas extending around a galaxy beyond its visible stellar disk.

Cislunar Space

The region of space between Earth and the Moon, including the many orbital paths shaped by the gravity of both bodies. Tracking spacecraft there is harder than in low Earth orbit because objects are distant and their trajectories can change through several gravitational influences.

Civil Penalty Proceedings

A court process in which a regulator or other authorized party asks a court to impose a financial or other civil sanction for an alleged breach of law. It is not a criminal prosecution, and filing the case does not prove the allegation.

Classified Benchmark

A test set or evaluation procedure whose contents are restricted for national-security reasons. Keeping it confidential can protect sensitive attack knowledge, but also limits independent inspection of the benchmark.

Climate Adaptation

Adjustments that reduce harm or use opportunities arising from actual or expected climate effects.

Climate Feedback

A process triggered by climate change that alters the original change. A positive feedback amplifies warming, while a negative feedback reduces it. The term does not by itself mean that the process is irreversible.

Climate Overshoot

A period when global warming rises above a stated temperature limit, such as 1.5°C, before potentially declining below it later. The size and duration of the overshoot influence the severity and reversibility of climate impacts.

Climate Tipping Point

A threshold in the climate system beyond which a small additional change triggers a large, often self-reinforcing and hard-to-reverse shift to a new state.

Clinical benchmark

A clinical benchmark is a structured set of cases, criteria and scoring rules used to compare a system's performance on healthcare-related tasks. It can reveal strengths and gaps under controlled conditions, but it does not replace prospective testing with patients or demonstrate improved health outcomes.

Clinical Complete Response(cCR)

The absence of detectable disease using the clinical examinations, imaging, endoscopy, laboratory tests, or other assessments specified for a condition after treatment. It does not necessarily prove that every cancer cell is gone and is distinct from pathological complete response.

Clinical decision support system(CDSS)

Software that analyzes patient information and medical knowledge to help clinicians make decisions such as selecting tests, identifying risks or considering diagnoses. It supports professional judgment and does not by itself establish that a tool is safe or authorized for autonomous care.

Clinical Trial Enrollment Pause

A temporary stop on adding new participants to a clinical trial while dosing or follow-up may continue for people already enrolled. Sponsors, safety boards, regulators, or investigators may use a pause to examine adverse events, manufacturing issues, protocol changes, or new evidence. It is different from terminating the trial and does not by itself establish that a treatment is unsafe.

Technology glossary