factor

American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition

1. n. One that actively contributes to an accomplishment, result, or process: "Surprise is the greatest factor in war” ( Tom Clancy). See Synonyms at element.
2. n. One who acts for someone else; an agent.
3. n. A person or firm that accepts accounts receivable as security for short-term loans.
4. n. Mathematics One of two or more quantities that divides a given quantity without a remainder. For example, 2 and 3 are factors of 6; a and b are factors of ab.
5. n. A quantity by which a stated quantity is multiplied or divided, so as to indicate an increase or decrease in a measurement: The rate increased by a factor of ten.
6. n. A gene. No longer in technical usage.
7. n. Physiology A substance that functions in a specific biochemical reaction or bodily process, such as blood coagulation.
8. v. To determine or indicate explicitly the factors of.
9. factor in To figure in: We factored sick days and vacations in when we prepared the work schedule.

Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia

1. n. One who transacts business for another or others; specifically, in com., a commission-merchant; an agent intrusted with the possession of goods for sale. “The distinctive features of his position are: he pursues the business of receiving and selling goods as a trade or calling; the goods are received either in bulk or sample into his possession; he has power to sell; he serves for a commission, although in exceptional cases remuneration may be made in some other way; he is generally resident in some other place than his principal.” (Wharton, On Agency, § 435.) More loosely, a factor is an agent to buy or sell goods, or both, and to handle them, to buy or sell bills of exchange, and do other business on account of persons in other places.
2. n. In Scotland, a person appointed by a heritor, landholder, or house-proprietor to manage an estate, to let lands or tenements on lease, to collect rents, etc.
3. n. An agent or a deputy generally.
4. n. In American law, in some of the United States, a person charged as a garnishee.
5. n. In mathematics, one of the two or more numbers, expressions, or quantities which when multiplied together produce a given product: as, 6 and 3 are factors of 18. As every product can be divided by any of its factors without remainder, factor may also be defined as an expression or quantity by which another expression or quantity may be divided without a remainder.
6. n. One of several circumstances, elements, or influences which tend to the production of a given result.
7. n. See the adjectives.
8. To act as factor for; look after, let, and draw the rents for; manage: as, to factor property.
9. In mathematics, to resolve into factors: as, x—y is factored into (x + y) (x—y).
10. To act as factor.
11. n. In electricity, in alternating current-waves, a constant which characterizes the shape of the wave: usually defined as the ratio of the effective value of the wave to the effective value of a sine wave of equal mean value.
12. n. Specifically, in an engine, the ratio of the difference between the maximum and mean turning moments to the mean turning moment. This factor determines the weight of the fly-wheel necessary to make the engine run steadily, the function of the fly-wheel being the storing up of energy at the time of the maximum turning moment, or when it is greater than the mean, and the giving up of that energy when the turning moment is less than the mean.

Wiktionary

1. n. obsolete A doer, maker; a person who does things for another person or organization
2. n. An agent or representative.
3. n. An integral part
4. n. mathematics Any of various objects multiplied together to form some whole
5. n. root cause analysis Influence; a phenomenon that affects the nature, the magnitude, and/or the timing of a consequence
6. n. economics A resource used in the production of goods or services, a factor of production.
7. v. transitive To find all the factors of (a number or other mathematical object) (the objects that divide it evenly).
8. v. of a number or other mathematical object, intransitive To be a product of other objects.

GNU Webster's 1913

1. n. (Law) One who transacts business for another; an agent; a substitute; especially, a mercantile agent who buys and sells goods and transacts business for others in commission; a commission merchant or consignee. He may be a home factor or a foreign factor. He may buy and sell in his own name, and he is intrusted with the possession and control of the goods; and in these respects he differs from a broker.
2. n. Scot. A steward or bailiff of an estate.
3. n. (Math.) One of the elements or quantities which, when multiplied together, form a product.
4. n. One of the elements, circumstances, or influences which contribute to produce a result; a constituent; a contributory cause.
5. v. (Mach.) To resolve (a quantity) into its factors.

WordNet 3.0

1. n. an abstract part of something
2. n. any of the numbers (or symbols) that form a product when multiplied together
3. v. consider as relevant when making a decision
4. n. (genetics) a segment of DNA that is involved in producing a polypeptide chain; it can include regions preceding and following the coding DNA as well as introns between the exons; it is considered a unit of heredity
5. v. be a contributing factor
6. n. a businessman who buys or sells for another in exchange for a commission
7. n. one of two or more integers that can be exactly divided into another integer
8. n. an independent variable in statistics
9. v. resolve into factors
10. n. anything that contributes causally to a result