valency

Definition of Valency in English :

1. valency

the phenomenon of forming chemical bonds

2. valence, valency

(biology) a relative capacity to unite or react or interact as with antigens or a biological substrate

3. valence, valency

(chemistry) a property of atoms or radicals; their combining power given in terms of the number of hydrogen atoms (or the equivalent)

WordNet Lexical Database for English. Princeton University. 2010.

Valency

noun plural -cies or -ces

1. chemistry

a property of atoms or groups, equal to the number of atoms of hydrogen that the atom or group could combine with or displace in forming compounds

2. linguistics

the number of satellite noun phrases with which a verb combines

the English verb 'give' takes a subject and two objects, so it has a valency of three

3. immunology

a.

the number of antigen-binding sites on an antibody molecule

b.

the number of antigen-binding sites with which an antigen can combine

n.

Variant of valence.