complex meaning

Adjective: complex  kóm'pleks

1. Complicated in structure; consisting of interconnected parts
   "a complex set of variations based on a simple folk melody"; "a complex mass of diverse laws and customs"

Noun: complex  kómpleks

1. A conceptual whole made up of complicated and related parts
   "the complex of shopping malls, houses, and roads created a new town"
   - composite 
2. A compound described in terms of the central atom to which other atoms are bound or coordinated
   - coordination compound 
3. (psychoanalysis) a combination of emotions and impulses that have been rejected from awareness but still influence a person's behaviour 
4. A whole structure (as a building) made up of interconnected or related structures
   - building complex

Derived forms: complexes

See also: analysable [Brit, Cdn], analyzable [N. Amer], Byzantine, colonial, complexity, complexly, complexness, complicated, composite, compound, convoluted, daedal, decomposable, difficult, Gordian, hard, interlacing, interlinking, interlocking, interwoven, intricate, involved, knotty, labyrinthian, labyrinthine, mazy, multifactorial, multiplex, tangled, thickening, tortuous

Type of: chemical compound, compound, construction, feeling, structure, whole

Antonym: simple

Encyclopedia: Complex

[Medicine]
adj
1 : having many varied interrelated parts, patterns, or elements and consequently hard to understand ‹complex behavior› ‹a complex personality› ‹complex plants and animals›
2 : formed by the union of simpler chemical substances ‹complex proteins›
n
1 : a group of repressed memories, desires, and ideas that exert a dominant influence on the personality and behavior ‹a guilt complex› —see CASTRATION COMPLEX, ELECTRA COMPLEX, INFERIORITY COMPLEX, OEDIPUS COMPLEX, PERSECUTION COMPLEX, SUPERIORITY COMPLEX
2 : a group of chromosomes arranged or behaving in a particular way —see GENE COMPLEX
3 : a chemical association of two or more species (as ions or molecules) joined usu. by weak electrostatic bonds rather than by covalent bonds
4 : the sum of the factors (as symptoms and lesions) characterizing a disease ‹primary tuberculous complex›
³com·plex
vt
1 : to form into a complex ‹RNA complexed with protein›
2 : CHELATE
¦ vi : to form a complex ‹hormones which must complex with specific receptors›

[Computer]
(CISC) A processor where each instruction can perform several low-level operations such as memory access, arithmetic operations or address calculations. The term was coined in contrast to Reduced Instruction Set Computer.

Before the first RISC processors were designed, many computer architects were trying to bridge the "semantic gap" - to design instruction sets to support high-level languages by providing "high-level" instructions such as procedure call and return, loop instructions such as "decrement and branch if non-zero" and complex addressing modes to allow data structure and array accesses to be compiled into single instructions.

While these architectures achieved their aim of allowing high-level language constructs to be expressed in fewer instructions, it was observed that they did not always result in improved performance. For example, on one processor it was discovered that it was possible to improve the performance by NOT using the procedure call instruction but using a sequence of simpler instructions instead. Furthermore, the more complex the instruction set, the greater the overhead of decoding an instruction, both in execution time and silicon area. This is particularly true for processors which used microcode to decode the (macro) instruction. It is easier to debug a complex instruction set implemented in microcode than one whose decoding is "hard-wired" in silicon.

Examples of CISC processors are the Motorola 680x0 family and the Intel 80186 through Intel 486 and Pentium.

• b complex:    Noun: B complexOri ...
• base complex:    [Defence] See Army ...
• building complex:    Noun: building com ...

Examples

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1. infrared spectra are exceedingly complex.
2. libraries are great complexes of tiny items.
3. they bind to antigen--antibody complexes.
4. the synaptonemal complex is protein in nature.
5. we learned about the complex motion of the moon.