In telecommunications and fiber optics, ovality or noncircularity is the degree of deviation from perfect circularity of the cross section of the core or cladding of the fiber.
The cross-sections of the core and cladding are assumed to a first approximation to be elliptical. Quantitatively, the ovality of either the core or cladding is expressed as
In measurements, ovality is the amount of out-of-roundness of a hole or cylindrical part in the typical form of an oval.
In chemistry
In computational chemistry, especially in QSAR studies, ovality refers to, a measure of how the shape of a molecule approaches a sphere (at one extreme) or a cigar shape (at the other). Ovality is described by a ratio of volume to area:
where:
O = OvalityA = AreaV = VolumeThe ovality of the He atom is 1.0 and that of HC24H (12 triple bonds) is ~1.7.