Vortex \vor"tex\, n.; pl. E. vortexes, L. Vortices. [L vortex, vertex, -icis, fr. vortere, vertere, to turn..]

1. A mass of fluid, especially of a liquid, having a whirling or circular motion tending to form a cavity or vacuum in the center of the circle, and to draw in towards the center bodies subject to its action; the form assumed by a fluid in such motion; a whirlpool; an eddy
2. (Cartesian System) A supposed collection of particles of very subtile matter, endowed with a rapid rotary motion around an axis which was also the axis of a sun or a planet. Descartes attempted to account for the formation of the universe, and the movements of the bodies composing it, by a theory of vortices
3. (Zoöl.) Any one of numerous species of small Turbellaria belonging to Vortex and allied genera. (Chem.), a hypothetical ring-shaped mass of elementary matter in continuous vortical motion. It is conveniently regarded in certain mathematical speculations as the typical form and structure of the chemical atom
4. Vortex wheel, a kind of turbine the shape of something rotating rapidly [syn: whirl, swirl, convolution]
5. A powerful circular current of water (usually the resulting of conflicting tides) [syn: whirlpool, maelstrom]