Other forms: orbitals
Orbital means to do with the path one body takes around another. Orbital period, orbital mechanics, orbital velocity.
Orbital period is the time for one full circuit — about 90 minutes for a satellite in low earth orbit, a year for the earth. In chemistry, an orbital is the region where an electron is likely to be found, which is a probability cloud rather than a path. In Britain an orbital is also a ring road: the M25 is the orbital. Note orbit, orbiter.
1adjectiveorbitalTo do with the path one body takes around another.
“The space station's orbital path takes it around the Earth many times a day.”
2nounringA ring road, in British use.
“The orbital runs roughly a hundred and twenty miles.”
orbital is a quality of orbiting.
Medieval Latin orbitalis comes from orbita, a wheel track, from orbis, a circle. Orb and orbit come from the same circle.
Medieval Latin
orbitālis
English, today
orbital
Medieval Latin orbitālis, from orbita + -ālis, equivalent to orbit + -al. a doublet of orbitalis.
Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA