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An italic capital Z, resistance extended to alternating current.
Also known as: Impedance, Complex resistance
Sometimes confused with: AC resistance
Impedance is resistance for AC, and it is a complex number: its real part is resistance and its imaginary part is reactance. That complexity is not a mathematical convenience — it encodes the phase shift between voltage and current, which is real and measurable.
Denotes electrical impedance: the complex ratio of voltage to current in an AC circuit.
Contexts: Laboratory
Has resistance as its real part and reactance as its imaginary part, the argument of the complex number being the phase shift.
Contexts: Laboratory
Collides with atomic number and with the partition function, both also Z.
Contexts: Laboratory
An italic capital letter Z, two horizontal strokes joined by a diagonal.